Darling, William Lafayette (1856-1938).

Biography

Consulting Engineer.

Office: 2100 Iglehart Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota.

Married: Alice Ernestine Bevans, April 15, 1901.

Education: Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Worcester Polytechnic Institute is a private university located in Worcester, Massachusetts, in the United States.Founded in 1865 in Worcester, WPI was one of the United States' first engineering and technology universities...

 (Bachelor’s of Science, 1877); [lettered in] baseball

Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

 and American football

American football

American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...

; Doctor of Engineering, 1927.

Career

Entered engineering construction, Northern Pacific Railroad, 1879 to 1883; division engineer, St. Paul and Northern Pacific (now Northern Pacific), 1883 to 1884; engineer, Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, 1884; engineer, location and construction, St. Andrews Bay and Chipley, 1884 to 1885; resident engineer in charge of terminals in St. Paul and Minneapolis, Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

, Burlington and Northern (now Chicago, Burlington and Quincy), 1885 to 1887; engineer, location and construction, Duluth, Watertown and Pacific (now Great Northern Railway), 1887; located the line afterwards built by the Great Northern from Sioux Falls to Yankton, South Dakota

Yankton, South Dakota

Yankton is a city in, and the county seat of, Yankton County, South Dakota, United States. The population was 14,454 at the 2010 census. Yankton was the original capital of Dakota Territory. It is named for the Yankton tribe of Nakota Native Americans...

, 1887 to 1888; engineer in charge of washout repairs from Minot, North Dakota

Minot, North Dakota

Minot is a city located in north central North Dakota in the United States. It is most widely known for the Air Force base located approximately 15 miles north of the city. With a population of 40,888 at the 2010 census, Minot is the fourth largest city in the state...

, to Great Falls, Montana

Great Falls, Montana

Great Falls is a city in and the county seat of Cascade County, Montana, United States. The population was 58,505 at the 2010 census. It is the principal city of the Great Falls, Montana Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Cascade County...

, Great Northern, 1888. The following positions with the Northern Pacific: in charge of construction of Howe truss bridge[s] in Montana

Montana

Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...

, 1888 to 1889; in charge of location and construction of line from Little Falls to Staples, Minnesota

Staples, Minnesota

As of the census of 2000, there were 3,104 people, 1,278 households, and 732 families residing in the city. The population density was 684.5 people per square mile . There were 1,436 housing units at an average density of 316.7 per square mile...

, 1889; in charge of location and construction of the Coeur d'Alene

Coeur d'Alene

Coeur d'Alene may refer to a people and related place names in the northwestern United States:* Coeur d'Alene Tribe, a First Nations/Native American tribe** Coeur d'Alene language** Coeur d'Alene Reservation** Coeur d'Alene v. Idaho, a U.S...

 Branch, 1889 to 1890; principal assistant engineer in charge of engineering and construction, 1891 to 1892; division engineer in charge of engineering from St. Paul, Minnesota, to Billings, Montana

Billings, Montana

Billings is the largest city in the U.S. state of Montana, and is the principal city of the Billings Metropolitan Area, the largest metropolitan area in over...

, 1892 to 1896; division engineer and assistant chief engineer, 1896 to 1901; chief engineer, 1901 to 1903. Chief engineer and vice-president, Gulf Construction Company, building a line from St. Louis to Kansas City

Kansas City, Missouri

Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...

, 1905; chief engineer, Pacific Railway (now Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad

Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad

The Milwaukee Road, officially the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad , was a Class I railroad that operated in the Midwest and Northwest of the United States from 1847 until its merger into the Soo Line Railroad on January 1, 1986. The company went through several official names...

), 1905 to 1906; chief engineer, Northern Pacific system and allied lines and during same period was vice-president and construction engineer in charge of construction of the Portland and Seattle Railway (now Spokane, Portland and Seattle), also during this period was construction engineer of the Pittsburgh and Gilmore.

Since 1916 he has been consulting engineer, at St. Paul with the following activities: Associate member, Naval Consulting Board during the World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

; appointed a member of the Advisory Commission of Railway Experts to Russia by the Secretary of State, 1917; Member of Board of Economics and Engineering for the Owners of Railroad Securities in New York, 1921 to 1922. Public office: Member, City Planning Board, St. Paul; Member, City Zoning Board, St. Paul.

In 1926, the Trustees of the Worcester Polytechnic Institute established the policy of granting a limited number of honorary degrees, including Doctor of Engineering. In 1927, the degree was conferred upon William L. Darling.

Clubs and fraternities

Member American Railway Engineering Association (former director); American Society of Civil Engineers

American Society of Civil Engineers

The American Society of Civil Engineers is a professional body founded in 1852 to represent members of the civil engineering profession worldwide. It is the oldest national engineering society in the United States. ASCE's vision is to have engineers positioned as global leaders who strive toward...

; Permanent Association of Navigation Congresses; General Contractors of America (honorary member); Minnesota Club, St. Paul; University Club, St. Paul; Thirty-second degree Mason

Freemasonry

Freemasonry is a fraternal organisation that arose from obscure origins in the late 16th to early 17th century. Freemasonry now exists in various forms all over the world, with a membership estimated at around six million, including approximately 150,000 under the jurisdictions of the Grand Lodge...

; Shriner.

Further reading

• No author. Who’s Who in Railroading – United States, Canada, Mexico, Cuba – 1930 Edition. New York: Simmons-Boardman, 1930, p. 124.

• Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Seventy Years of the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Available on the Web at www.wpi.edu/Academics/Library/Archives/SeventyYears/page342.html.

• WPI Journal. "People of the Century: Building Iron Rails." Worcester Polytechnic Institute: Spring, 1988. Available on the Web at: www.wpi.edu/News/Journal/Spring98/rails.html. Ironically, four of the five WPI civil engineering graduates listed in this article are early veterans of the Northern Pacific!

• Dorsey, Michael W. "Maintaining a Lifeline." WPI Transformations. Discusses NP
  Northern Pacific Railway
  The Northern Pacific Railway was a railway that operated in the west along the Canadian border of the United States. Construction began in 1870 and the main line opened all the way from the Great Lakes to the Pacific when former president Ulysses S. Grant drove in the final "golden spike" in...
  
   veterans Darling and Benjamin O. Johnson's experiences as Americans working to maintain the Trans-Siberian Railroad during World War I
  World War I
  World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
  
  . Available on the Web at: www.wpi.edu/News/Transformations/2005Winter/timecapsule.html.

• Personal papers from Darling's time in Russia
  Russia
  Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
  
   circa World War I
  World War I
  World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
  
   are held by the Hoover Institution
  Hoover Institution
  The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace is a public policy think tank and library founded in 1919 by then future U.S. president, Herbert Hoover, an early alumnus of Stanford....
  
  , Stanford University
  Stanford University
  The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
  
  . Official papers as chief engineer of the Northern Pacific Railway
  Northern Pacific Railway
  The Northern Pacific Railway was a railway that operated in the west along the Canadian border of the United States. Construction began in 1870 and the main line opened all the way from the Great Lakes to the Pacific when former president Ulysses S. Grant drove in the final "golden spike" in...
  
   are held by the Minnesota Historical Society
  Minnesota Historical Society
  The Minnesota Historical Society is a private, non-profit educational and cultural institution dedicated to preserving the history of the U.S. state of Minnesota. It was founded by the territorial legislature in 1849, almost a decade before statehood. The Society is named in the Minnesota...
  
  , St. Paul, Minnesota.