AISC to honor Thornton of Charles Thornton and Co.

Charles Thornton, Ph.D., P.E., chairman of Charles Thornton and Co. LLC and co-founder of Thornton Tomasetti will be honored by the AISC with the 2010 Designer Lifetime Achievement Award at the North American Steel Construction Conference in Orlando, Fla. on May 13th. The award honors individuals who have provided outstanding contributions to the advancement of the structural steel design industry. "Charles has given many years of extraordinary service to AISC and the structural steel design, construction, and academic community," said Roger Ferch, P.E., AISC president. "We're pleased to award him with one of AISC's highest honors." Thornton has received a number of distinguished honors, including: election to the National Academy of Engineering in 1997; named Honorary Member of the American Society of Civil Engineers in 1999; awarded Engineering News-Record's Award of Excellence 2001; selected to receive the Hoover Medal for 2002; and selected to receive the Benjamin Franklin Medal in Civil Engineering for 2003; elected to membership in the National Academy of Construction in 2005; elected to Honorary Member of the American Institute of Architects in 2006; and the Construction Industry Institute's Carroll H. Dunn Award of Excellence in 2009. Throughout his career as a structural engineer, Thornton has been involved in the engineering and design of hospitals, arenas, high-rise buildings, airports and transportation facilities worldwide. The firm he founded with Richard Tomasetti recently established the Thornton Tomasetti Foundation to support the education and community outreach activities of students aspiring to careers in the design profession. Thornton is also chairman and founder of the Architecture, Construction and Engineering (ACE) Mentor Program and chairman emeritus of the Salvadori Center, a nonprofit educational organization in New York.