Robert F. McCune*

When he was five years old, Robert McCune helped his mother pick up chunks of coal along the railroad tracks for fuel. When he was 10, he peddled home-grown vegetables with a horse and wagon. He also earned money caring for a herd of dairy cows.

McCune's climb to engineering fame began in 1924 while working with a survey crew. When McCune was 19, he enrolled in correspondence school for technical education. To finance business college studies, he worked as a janitor and clerk in a retail hardware store for 28 cents an hour. Hard work earned him a worldwide reputation for getting things done. With 30,000 construction workers and 2,000 engineers under his direction, McCune saw that Fort Leonard Wood, a U.S. Army base, was completed in five months. McCune also served as chief construction supervisor for Charles Luckman Associates, the builder of New York's Madison Square Garden sports complex.