At TMS’s 2008 Annual Meeting Awards Luncheon on October 18th, TMS Vice President, John Chrysler, who chairs TMS’s Awards Committee, presented three Society’s  Service Awards to Ben Harris, Paul Hoggatt and Mark McGinley. The Masonry Society started this award in 2006 to recognize individuals who volunteer in special, and typically unseen, ways. The intent of the award is to recognize those who continually assist the Society, but who are not normally recognized for their efforts.

While one of TMS’s young members, Ben Harris, of Clough, Harbour and Associates, has already made significant contributions to The Masonry Society, serving on numerous committees and volunteering his time freely.

Of special note for this award, is Ben’s work “behind the scenes”. Ben recently produced for TMS a set of structural drawings for our new Inspection of Masonry Construction seminars which were needed for the plan reading section of the course. TMS was unable to acquire a current, non-copyrighted set of plans, and Ben willingly volunteered numerous hours to produce an excellent set of plans that will assist in the training of inspectors by TMS. Ben is also worthy of a Service Award for his efforts to develop a Direct Design method for typical masonry structures, which he has spearheaded through our Design Practices Committee. Ben serves in many other roles – recently chairing the DPC meetings in Cancun when Bill Wood was unable to attend the meeting, chairing the Haller Award Committee, leading the TMS Investigating Disasters program, and serving on disaster investigation teams – all of which show his tremendous contributions to TMS making him worthy of this award.

Paul Hoggatt, President of Hoggatt G.P., LLC, is extremely generous with both his time and funds to TMS, in his quiet, soft spoken way. Besides donating financially to TMS, he has served TMS in numerous ways in times of need, including recently leading the Construction Practices Committee when the chairman unexpectedly was no longer able to serve.

Before TMS TAC could even consider what to do about the issue, Paul voluntarily stepped forward and offered to help; which included chairing the meeting in Cancun and following up after the meeting with numerous e-mails to develop ballots with the committee.

This was not a lone example of Paul’s willingness to step forward in times of need, nor of his commitment to TMS; rather when Turner Smith, a former chair of the CPC became ill, Paul filled in very ably in Turner’s absence and Paul later accepted chairmanship of the committee which resulted in the completion of TMS’s Inspection Checklist for Masonry Construction. Besides these examples of Paul’s service to TMS, he has also served on the Board of Directors, the Nominating Committee, and the 8th North American Masonry Conference Industry Liaison Committee.

Mark  McGinley, professor at the University of Louisville, is a tremendous supporter of TMS, having served in numerous roles including as chairman of the Electronic Communications Committee and the Design Practices Committee, and as a member of the Masonry Standards Joint Committee, TMS’s Board of Directors, the Technical Activities Committee, the Research Committee, and the Standards Development Committee.

Mark is especially being nominated for a Service Award because of the way he has stepped up in recent times of need – taking of the DPC Box Example Team for the MDG after the passing of Bill Wood and for chairing the MSJC’s Reinforcement and Connectors Subcommittee when the chair had to step down unexpectedly. These examples show how Mark fills in during times of need and helps the Society whenever possible. Much more could be said about Mark’s service to TMS, including his service on several disaster investigation teams, his authoring and reviewing numerous papers in TMS Journal and NAMC proceedings, his service as a seminar developer and speaker, and as his supporter of TMS staff. But because I only have five sentences, I’ll end here, and say that Mark contributes in countless ways, most unseen, to help TMS advance the knowledge of masonry.