April 16, 2014

AASHTO Presidential Profile: Morris L. Shadburn, Georgia

As AASHO celebrated its 50th anniversary, the association's annual meeting took place in Atlanta, Georgia – the city where state highway officials in November 1914 had agreed to hold the meeting in Washington, D.C., that would result in the establishment of the organization. Fittingly enough, a native son of Georgia was elected AASHO's 53rd president at that December 1964 annual meeting to lead AASHO in the first year of its second half-century of existence.

That president's name was Morris Luther Shadburn. Born on Feb. 4, 1897, in the Atlanta-area city of Buford, he received his high school education there and in 1917 graduated from the Georgia School of Technology (now the Georgia Institute of Technology) with a B.S. in civil engineering.

Shadburn subsequently entered the U.S. Army and, during World War I, served in France with the 26th Division of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF). He was cited by General John J. Pershing, who led the AEF, for meritorious service at the Battle of Belleau Wood in June 1918 near the Marne River in France. That same year, Shadburn was similarly recognized for his military service with a War Cross presented by King Albert I of Belgium.

After being discharged from the U.S. Army, Shadburn ran the Georgia Institute of Technology's highway materials laboratory for several months before he began working for the general office of the Georgia Highway Department. He was division engineer for that agency when he resigned in 1923 to too serve as a consulting engineer in Louisiana. Shadburn's efforts in that position included building a dock on the Mississippi River and working on sanitary and storm sewers. In addition, he spent a few years in Gulfport, Mississippi, engaged in such tasks as sea wall activities.

Shadburn joined the Georgia-based Penn-Dixie Cement Corporation in 1930 as a field engineer. He found himself back at the Georgia Highway Department in 1933, and became state highway engineer in 1941. In 1943, he resigned from that position to work for the construction firm Sam E. Finley, Inc., as engineer and general superintendent for asphalt paving projects. Shadburn returned to the Georgia Highway Department in November 1948 to again serve as state highway engineer.

Even as he led Georgia's post-World War II highway construction efforts, Shadburn found time to serve in other professional activities that focused on road priorities not just within his home state but beyond it. Those activities included serving as a member of both the Traffic Operations Subcommittee of the President's Committee for Traffic Safety and the Department of Traffic and Operations of the Highway Research Board; director of the American Road Builders Association; and president of the Southeastern Association of State Highway Officials.

Shadburn was likewise heavily involved in AASHO activities. He was a member of the association's Executive Committee and chairman of the Committee on Traffic. Shadburn also represented AASHO on the National Committee on Uniform Traffic Laws and Ordinances. In addition, he served on such other association groups as the Special Committee on Signing and Marking the Interstate System, Committee on Emergency Planning, Committee on Administration, and Special Committee on Project Procedures.

After serving as AASHO vice president, Shadburn assumed the presidency of the association at an important time for road-building priorities nationwide. DeWitt C. Greer, longtime state highway engineer of the Texas Highway Department, would later say that Shadburn "gave us the great leadership we so badly needed at that particular time."

A key priority during Shadburn's time in office involved construction of the Interstate Highway System. A substantial amount of progress had been made in building the highways for that network by the time Shadburn became president, but a lot remained to be done.

"As we review the accomplishments of the Highway Departments in the 51st year of AASHO, we may be proud of the progress being made by the Bureau of Public Roads and States in the greatest Road Program of the Ages," proclaimed Shadburn at the end of his term as president at the association's annual meeting in New York City in October 1965. In that address, however, he also emphasized ever-growing needs for that highways network that demanded AASHO's increased attention and involvement – including a review of air rights over those routes, how to better control litter, the location and maintenance of rest areas, and traffic safety measures to red

Another association milestone during Shadburn's presidential term was the establishment of the AASHO Materials Reference Laboratory (AMRL) as a Research Associate Program at the National Bureau of Standards -- now known as the National Institute of Standards and Technology -- in what became a major step in the standardization of construction materials across the nation.

In 1967, Shadburn was the recipient of AASHO's Thomas H. MacDonald Award in recognition of his achievements in highway administration, engineering, and research. As AASHO Executive Director noted in presenting Shadburn with that award at that year's annual meeting in Salt Lake City, "In reviewing his work in AASHO, you will see that he is another of those very busy people who does an excellent job of handling his State highway department duties and still finds time to work on matters of National importance."

Shadburn stepped down as Georgia's state highway engineer at the start of the following year, and went on to become executive director of the then-new Georgia Crushed Stone Association. He died at his home in Atlanta on Dec. 19, 1970, at the age of 73.