Sam Anthony, P.E., the 2014 ASCE Rochester Section Engineer of the Year and an ASCE Fellow, retired on September 18, 2020. Mr. Anthony spent 42 years as an engineering practitioner in bridge design, choosing to spend the past 34 years as an integral part of Erdman Anthony.
Sam’s portfolio includes notable work on the Brooklyn Bridge Rehabilitation project (As a structural engineer at Steinman Boynton Gronquist & Birdsall), designing and implementing a 3-D model of the bridge to evaluate the condition of its suspension system for hanger replacement. As engineer of record, he led the design team to a unique and aesthetically-pleasing solution of a new gateway bridge carrying I-490 over the Genesee River in downtown Rochester, NY. This multiple award-winning structure, the Frederick Douglass–Susan B. Anthony Memorial Bridge, opened in 2007 and was featured in Structure Magazine.
Present and future bridge engineers will continue to benefit from Sam’s design innovations. Rochester’s Combined Sewer Overflow Abatement Project (CSOAP) is a design that set the standard for these types of systems and is highlighted in the Environmental Protection Agency’s guidelines. Another example is his participation in writing an owner’s manual for the I-81 Bridges over Oneida Lake and the NYS Barge Canal. This manual was requested by New York State DOT following the rehabilitation of those bridges, a project which won an ACEC-NY Silver Award in 2019.
Throughout his career, Sam has been an active participant in, contributor to, and leader of several professional associations, including ASCE at local, state, and national levels, and in the wider community.
He has worked with students of all ages to develop their appreciation for and commitment to excellent engineering, presenting to rapt audiences of elementary school children and teaching structural engineering at Rochester Institute of Technology and a graduate-level steel-design course at the State University of New York at Buffalo’s department of civil engineering.
Reflecting on Sam Anthony’s career would be incomplete without recalling that in 1954 his father Ed Anthony joined Paul Erdman to found our company to meet a growing need for superior infrastructure engineering and support services for people and their communities. That same year, the Ed Anthony-designed Troup-Howell Bridge in downtown Rochester opened. As Ed worked to grow the company, he would often bring his young son with him to the office on weekends. Two generations later, Ed’s son, Sam, would lead the design team replacing the Troup-Howell Bridge with the Frederick Douglass-Susan B. Anthony Memorial Bridge.
The Rochester community, and people in communities throughout the eastern United States, are fortunate to have had engineers Ed and Sam Anthony, father and son, helping to provide safer, efficient travel for generations of commuters. We could not be prouder that Sam chose to spend his career with Erdman Anthony. In honor of his career and in gratitude for his contributions, we thank him for his commitment, mentorship, and leadership. Thank you, Sam. We will miss you. Enjoy your retirement!