Engineers / Frank McClure

Frank E. McClure (California Structural Engineer License [SE] 649) was born in San Francisco and earned his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from University of California, Berkeley in 1944. Following this, he was commissioned as a Navy officer and served in World War II with the legendary Seabees construction battalions in Okinawa, Japan.

Returning from the War, Frank worked for several engineering firms in San Francisco before opening his own office in Oakland in 1955 and then forming McClure and Messenger with David Messenger in 1962.  During this period, he served as structural engineer on scores of schools, hospitals and building retrofit projects. In 1976, he left private practice to oversee structural engineering projects on all University of California campuses. Two years later, he became senior structural engineer for the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, retiring in 1991.

Beginning with the 1952 Kern County earthquakes, on his own time and using his own resources, he visited sites of damaging earthquakes and documented damage and losses to improve understanding of earthquake design and construction. These earthquakes included the 1954 Eureka, 1964 Alaska, 1966 Parkfield, 1967 Caracas, 1969 Santa Rosa, 1971 San Fernando, 1975 Oroville, 1978 Santa Barbara, 1980 Livermore, 1985 Mexico City, 1987 Whittier Narrows, and 1989 Loma Prieta earthquakes.

Frank was a member of the Structural Engineering Association of California (Director 1963–1964, 1966–1967), Structural Engineering Association of Northern California (honorary member, Seismology Committee 1957-1959) and many other professional societies. He was an early member of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI), serving as EERI Secretary (1969 -1976), Director (1977–1979), President (1987–1988), and was elected as an EERI honorary member in 1989.

In 1990, Frank received the U.S. Department of Energy’s Distinguished Associate Award in recognition of his 46 years of work reducing seismic hazards and for his leadership in the field. Two of his most influential works were Studies in Seismicity and Earthquake Damage Statistics (1969, with Karl Steinbrugge) and a 1973 study Performance of Single-Family Dwellings in the San Fernando Earthquake of February 9, 1971.

Selected Bibliography

1. Frank E. McClure, Interviews by Stanley Scott Series, an oral history conducted 1986–1993 by Stanley Scott, and then edited in 2025 by Charles Scawthorn, Earthquake Engineering Research Institute.
2. McClure, Frank E.; Steinbrugge, Karl V.; Snow, A. J. (1969). Studies in Seismicity and Earthquake Damage Statistics, Part 1. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce, Coast and Geodetic Survey.
3. McClure, Frank E. (1973). Performance of Single Family Dwellings in the San Fernando Earthquake of February 9, 1971. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Housing And Urban Development, Office Of Assistant Secretary For Policy Development And Research, U.S. Department Of Commerce, National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration.
4. McClure, Frank E. (1984). Development and Implementation of the University of California Seismic Safety Policy (PDF). Proceedings of the Eighth World Conference on Earthquake Engineering. San Francisco.
5. McClure, Frank E.; Messinger, David L. (1971). Earthquake Evaluation Studies on Existing Buildings on Various Campuses of the University of California. Oakland, CA: McClure and Messinger Consulting Structural Engineers.
6. McClure, Frank E. (1988). An Update Overview of the University of California Seismic Safety Program (PDF). Proceedings of the Ninth World Conference on Earthquake Engineering. Tokyo, Japan.
7. McClure, Frank E. (1989). “Lessons Learned from Recent Moderate Earthquakes”. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 558 (1). doi:1111/j.1749-6632.1989.tb22574.x.

• SEAOC Director (1963–1964)
• SEAONC Honorary Member
• EERI President (1987–1979)
• EERI Honorary Member (1989)
• U.S. Department of Energy Distinguished Associate Award (1990)

• Henry J. Degenkolb
• Walter Dickey
• R. Gordon Dean
• Michael Pregnoff
• Dimitri Crineen
• Les Graham
• Wes Hayes
• Sigmund A. Freeman
• Karl V. Steinbrugge
• Loring Wyllie
• David Messenger
• Thomas Chase
• George Jennings

• Structural Engineers Assocation of California
• McClure and Messenger
• University of California, Berkeley
• Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

• 1971 San Fernando Earthquake
• 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake

• Interviews by Stanley Scott Series