About Us

The Dothan Branch of the American Society of Civil Engineers was created in 2004 with the mission of the advancement of the science and profession of Engineering in a manner consistent with the purpose of the American Society of Civil Engineers.  The area of the Dothan Branch is the counties of Barbour, Coffee, Dale, Geneva, Henry, Houston, and Pike in the State of Alabama. The Dothan Branch is a member of the Alabama Section which started in 1956, and now has over 1200 members statewide. The Alabama Section is a part of Region 5, which consist of the Alabama Section, Florida Section, Georgia Section, Louisiana Section, and Mississippi Section.

The officers of this Branch include a President, a Vice President, a Secretary and a Treasurer, who with the latest active resident Past-President constitute a Board of Directors in which the government of the Branch is vested. All officers are elected for terms of one year, which terms shall begin on October 1^st of each year. The current bylaws that the Dothan Branch of ASCE operates by was voted on and approved, and the bylaws may be adopted or amended only by the procedure listed in the Bylaws.

The current edition of Robert’s Rules of Order. Newly Revised shall govern the Branch in all cases to which they are applicable and in which they are not inconsistent with the bylaws and any special rules of order the Branch may adopt.

History of ASCE

The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)  is a tax-exempt professional body founded in 1852 to represent members of the civil engineering profession worldwide. Based in Reston, Virginia, it is the oldest national engineering society in the United States.

ASCE was founded in New York City on November 5, 1852, when twelve engineers—Julius W. Adams, J. W. Ayres, Alfred W. Craven, Thomas A. Emmet, Edward Gardiner, Robert B. Gorsuch, George S. Greene, James Laurie, W. H. Morell, S. S. Post, W. H. Talcott, and W. H. Sidell—met at the offices of the Croton Aqueduct and formed the American Society of Civil Engineers and Architects. It was the first national engineering society created in the United States. In 1869 the “Architects” was dropped from the name, as the architects formed their own society, the American Institute of Architects, in 1857.

As part of understanding the history of civil engineering and promoting the civil engineering profession, a survey of the historic accomplishments of civil engineers is continually conducted by ASCE members. Such reviews of civil engineering accomplishments have produced various lists of the notable categories and projects of the profession.

During the 1925 Mid-South convention of the ASCE, held in Memphis, Tennessee, engineers and their families were invited on a sightseeing trip aboard two ships. These ships, Choctaw and M.E. Norman, were operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The M.E. Norman, a steamship, capsized and sank in the Mississippi River, resulting in the deaths of 23 passengers and crew, including former ASCE president Paul Howes Norcross.

The prospect of a new millennium led the ASCE to reflect upon the civil engineering achievements of the 20th century with two events. First, the Millennium Challenge in 1999 identified the top-ten “civil engineering achievements that had the greatest positive impact on life in the 20th century”, which were to be “broad categories”, rather than “individual achievements”, which were reserved for the second event. Monuments of the Millennium selected and recognized feats of civil engineering that demonstrated a “combination of technical engineering achievement, courage and inspiration, and a dramatic influence on the development of their communities”.