Thank you all very much. No award that I might receive could mean more to me than this. It is an honor that I'm not sure that I deserve, especially when I look at the names and consider the accomplishments of the past recipients, many of whom I've known and have tremendous respect for. It is truly overwhelming to think that my fellow Webb alumni would consider me for inclusion in such an august group. I thank my wife for her continuing love and support. I thank my Webb classmates, Bob Johnson and Bill Webster, for traveling long distances to be here. I want to also thank Dr. Rod Barr (Class of '60) for agreeing to present the award tonight. Rod and I go back to our student days at Webb and he has been a good friend to my wife and me all through our lives together.

When our Association President, Hank Marcus, called to inform me of this award a few months ago, I was lying in bed recovering from oral surgery. My wife called up to say that Hank Marcus of the Webb Alumni Association was on the phone. A month or more earlier, we had been to one of the local alumni gatherings to boost the Capital Campaign at Webb now underway. Being a procrastinator, I had delayed sending in my pledge card and had just done so a day or two before Hank's call. I immediately said to my wife, "Tell him that I've sent in my pledge card." My wife relayed the message and then returned and told me, "The man said that he's not calling about pledges."

Webb is important and it is unique. It occupies a special niche in the array of institutions offering an engineering education in the USA. We all know the Webb attributes: small classes, very high standards, a balanced mix of academic and practical education, every student on scholarship, a strong honor system run by the students, excellent faculty, high faculty to student ratio and so on. Webb is hard to get into and even harder to graduate from. Webb is tough but its graduates possess an excellent undergraduate engineering education which serves as a springboard for a wide variety of possible careers. Webb alumni care for Webb and for its recent graduates. We who have received a Webb education must be grateful: First, to our founder- for his vision, benevolence and for the energy late in life to translate his vision into reality. Second, to all the administrators, staff members and faculty who for more than a century have worked long hours, often at sub-par wages, to sustain Webb and continually improve the education it provides. Third, to the many Webb alumni who have contributed time, talent and treasure to Webb and have assisted its young graduates by providing job opportunities and mentoring to them. We can never adequately thank all those members of the Webb family who have directly and indirectly contributed to our own Webb educations and to whatever success we have had in our subsequent careers. I believe that the best way we can thank all those who have helped us is to remember our predecessors, our teachers and our mentors and to honor them by doing our own part to help Webb and its recent grads.

I wish to recall tonight one such noble predecessor, William Selkirk Owen, the man whose name is attached to the award I've received. Due to the passage of time, I suspect that today, most living Webb grads have never met Dean Owen and are not familiar with his career, his personality and his tremendous impact on Webb and its graduates. I want to introduce this man to the younger Webb alumni. I think that this is appropriate because my class of '59 is one of the last that actually met and became acquainted with Dean Owen. Even though he had previously retired from Webb in 1950, when I was a student the Dean and his wife would regularly attend Webb social events. I remember his enthusiastic singing when we gathered around the piano at the annual Webb Christmas Party. For the information that follows, I have relied on the excellent Webb Centennial History by Ed Dunbaugh and also on the recollections of two of my mentors during my early years in the US Navy preliminary ship design organization, both Webb grads: Jim Mills, Class of '44B, and John Slager, '49.

William Selkirk Owen graduated from Webb's Academy in 1903 at the age of 19 (at that time, Webb did not award Bachelor of Science degrees). From 1914 through 1918, he served on the Webb's Academy faculty as an Assistant Professor of Mathematics. In the spring of 1918, he resigned from Webb to return to work in industry. There over the next ten years he gained broad experience in a variety of positions which made him exceptionally well qualified to teach naval architecture to Webb students. Prof. Owen returned to Webb in 1928 to teach naval architecture and become Dean of the Faculty. He remained on the faculty for the next 22 years as the senior professor of naval architecture. Dean Owen retired from Webb in the spring of 1950 and died in December, 1964 at age 80.

These are some facts concerning Dean Owen's career. What about the man himself, especially from his students' point of view? Dean Owen was liked, admired and respected by all his students as a teacher and mentor, even though they often mimicked his southern drawl. His enthusiasm for his subject and his encouragement were infectious. Here are quotes from four of his students:

Per Bob Mende (Class of '51), "he was a wonderfully warm, cheerful, almost father-like professor….. as well as a classic naval architect in the traditional sense."

Per Owen Oakley ('37): "I remember him as a tall, lean, good-looking man, but not handsome in the classical sense, with a long nose and great bushy eyebrows. When he engaged you in conversation, he listened attentively, murmuring "Hmmm-yawz" occasionally, nodding and waggling his eyebrows up and down in concert with your delivery. He used his hands expressively… I am sure every one of his students recalls how he used his hands to demonstrate the agony of shear and flexure of a ship's hull in a seaway. He had a remarkable memory. I believe he could recall the name of just about every student who ever sat in his classes."

Per Bob Slaughter ('42): "Professor Owen was one of a kind. His innate ability to look at a ship's lines and tell when they did NOT represent a fair surface was awe-inspiring, and his infinite patience with all of us made us revere him as the father of all good naval architects."

Per Jim Mills ('44B): "Professor Owen's enthusiasm and love for every aspect of his profession and his devotion to trying to impart it to his students has always impressed me as an ideal environment in which aspiring young naval architects could study. It was almost like learning by osmosis."

Dean Owen was universally known to his students as "Windy." The reason is explained by Jim Mills and John Slager. Jim Mills said that it was not until he was taking a course with Professor Owen relating to theoretical naval architecture that the meaning of this nickname became clear. The professor devoted so much time to talking about trochoidal waves that all the remaining topics had to be covered during the last two weeks of the semester. John Slager reported that his class would often distract Prof. Owen with a question that was sure to embroil Windy in a long-winded attempt to answer; this would give the class time to prepare for the daily Benny math quiz.

Jim Mills observed: "Professor Owen used some expressions not commonly found in the lexicon. One frequently used was, "I have an ACCUMULATED HUNCH that the answer to that is so and so." It wasn't very long before you came to realize that Prof. Owen's "accumulated hunch" was very nearly synonymous with CERTAINTY. Per John Slager: "Windy's word for an unfair lump on a buttock or waterline (spoken with his head on the blackboard or drawing board) was "excrescence". I'm not sure how he might have spelled it but my class labeled many things as "excrescences," John said.

Concerning style in the classroom, Ed Dunbaugh writes: "Many alumni remember the frustration engendered by his practice of sketching over a newly completed lines drawing with a broad, stubby pencil, to show how the line ought to have been drawn." Jim Mills states, "Prof. Owen disdained the use of blackboard erasers. When he lectured he would start in the upper left-hand corner of the blackboard, writing out what he was saying. He would proceed in this manner down to the bottom right-hand corner until the board was completely filled. If, at this point, he had something more to say, he did not erase anything, but turned his head sideways and began writing vertically up the side of the blackboard."

Here are a few anecdotes relating to Dean Owen.

From John Slager: "I believe Windy learned to drive when Webb moved out to Glen Cove. We all took great delight in watching the old-timer-new-driver maneuver his car (cruising at about 1 mile per hour) into his parking space."

Per Jim Mills: "The following incident gives some insight into Professor Owen's unusual memory and also the drawing board in his office, which was legendary. Professor Owen had written the first chapter of the new SNAME PNA text. This had occurred a couple of years before our class appeared on the scene, and for these earlier classes he had offered a $5.00 reward to anyone who could find an error in his chapter. He made the same offer to our class; I found what I felt was a legitimate candidate and gave it to him. I heard nothing for three years, until my senior year when one day I was invited to step into his office. This was my opportunity to see first hand his drawing board. It was covered to the level of at least two feet with drawings (rolled up and flat), magazines, etc. He patted his hand on the pile a couple of times, reached down somewhere in the middle, and came up with a check payable to me for $5.00. Apparently, if he came across some information that was important enough to put into that pile, he could retrieve it when the occasion arose. He had no need for a fancy filing system to keep track of things."

A final story from Jim Mills: "This tidbit is obviously related to rat-proofing of ships. Prof. Owen started off by stating that a full grown rat could get through a hole the diameter of a penny (3/4"). He continued with the information that if the opening was only 1/4" high but was unlimited in the other direction that the rat could still get through, the limiting anatomical part of the rat being its skull, which it could flatten out somewhat. This latter pearl of wisdom was vividly illustrated by Professor Owen putting his hand flat down in front of him on the lectern, laying his head down turned on its side between his hands, and remarking that "Ole Brother Rat would flatten himself out and wiggle and squirm until he got through that opening."

To conclude this description of Dean Owen, the following is a quote from a Binnacle article upon the occasion of his retirement from Webb in the spring of 1950:

"Twenty-six Webb graduating classes have known him, and known him as something more than a professor. To each member of those classes he has been a teacher, a counselor, and a friend. For Dean Owen did not equip Webbmen solely for naval architecture. He did not equip them to go into the world simply as "technicians of the highest order." Always he kept in mind that Webb also trained gentlemen and leaders, and he consistently bent his efforts to attain that end. The caliber of Webb graduates today is a living testimonial to his success. Dean Owen will not be at Webb next year, but next year's classes, and classes for many years to come, will, perhaps unknowingly, be affected by his work here."

I think that says it all. How beautifully written and how prophetic. Yes, Dean Owen has affected us all and for the better, as have many others who preceded us, taught us or mentored us. It is for us to emulate their gifts to us by giving in turn to our school and its students. Thank you all once again for your attention and for the great honor that you have bestowed upon me.