2004 Distinguished Engineering Graduates
Gail Chenoweth
B.S. P.E., 1982, Oil Asset Manager, Marathon Oil Co.R. Richard Rothwell
B.S.Ch.E. 1962, President, Horizon ResourcesJames J. Truchard
Ph.D. E.C.E. 1974, President and CEO, National InstrumentsJohnny Charles Wachel
B.S.M.E. 1957, M.S.M.E. 1959 Retired President, Engineering Dynamics, Inc.
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Gail Chenoweth B.S. P.E., 1982 Marathon Oil Co. |
Gail Chenoweth’s successful career in petroleum engineering management resulted this year in her selection as The University of Texas at Austin College of Engineering’s first female Distinguished Graduate.
Her first bachelor’s degree earned in studio art from UT Austin in 1976, failed to hint of her interest in the oil industry. But Chenoweth decided to try her hand in the field and returned to earn her bachelor’s degree in petroleum engineering by 1982.
After graduating, her internship experience landed her a job at Yates Engineering, part of Marathon Oil Company. She worked in several areas, including reservoir engineering and operations, before her transfer to Midland Operations, a division of Marathon, in 1988.
After relocating abroad several times, Chenoweth served as the engineering supervisor over international production for Marathon, and later as engineering manager of that group.
Following these positions, she became project manager of a team charged with redesigning the information technology landscape of Marathon. In that role, she implemented a company-wide risk-based economic analysis and portfolio management software package.
In 2001, she was selected as coordinating manager for Marathon’s senior vice president of worldwide production, and in the 2003 was named the Rocky Mountain oil asset team manager, where she oversees one of nine Marathon geographical regions.
Always conscious of her roots, Chenoweth has remained involved with the petroleum and geosystems engineering department at UT Austin and has served as chairman of its external advisory committee. She was a panel member for an alternate energy forum sponsored by the Student Engineering Council, has served as a mentor for female engineering students and has recruited for Marathon for many years.
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R. Richard Rothwell B.S.Ch.E. 1962 President, Horizon Resources |
After an active student life at The University of Texas at Austin, Dick Rothwell went on to become a leader in the petroleum industry as head of Horizon Resources.
Upon graduating from UT Austin, he spent a year in Indonesia working for Roy Huffington, Inc., where he successfully negotiated with Japanese Utilities for the financing of a liquefied natural gas plant. His other professional experience includes five years as vice president at APCO Oil Company, where he served as chairman of the Refining/Marketing/Supply Operating Committee; four years at Northern Natural Gas/Northern Petrochemical, where he was project manager for the design and construction of an ethylene oxide/glycol plant; and four years as a plant engineer for Humble Oil and Refining Company.
In 1976, Rothwell took on the role of entrepreneur and founded Horizon Resources, a company located in Houston, Texas that specializes in oil and gas exploration, futures trading and ranching.
Under his direction, Horizon Resources has discovered more than 285 billion cubic feet of natural gas and more than 20 million barrels of crude oil. Rothwell also spends much of his time trading petroleum products, equity indexes, financial instruments and currencies.
Rothwell received his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from UT Austin in 1962. While at the university, he was president of the student chapter of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, and a member of Tau Beta Pi, Phi Lambda Upsilon, Omega Chi Epsilon, and Alpha Chi Sigma.
Always a friend of the College of Engineering, he has remained actively involved with the chemical engineering department over the years, spearheading the McKetta Challenge, a fundraising effort that netted more than $1.25 million for the department. He also served on the chemical engineering external advisory committee and endowed a chair in the department.
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James J. Truchard Ph.D. E.C.E. 1974 President and CEO, National Instruments |
Dr. James J. Truchard, National Instruments president and CEO, co-founded the company in 1976 while working at The University of Texas at Austin. Under Truchard's leadership, National Instruments has pioneered the development of virtual instrumentation software and hardware that has revolutionized the way engineers approach measurement and automation applications.
In 1986, Truchard and Jeff Kodosky invented LabVIEW graphical development software. With LabVIEW, engineers and scientists can quickly and intuitively build a customer-defined solution for measurement and automation. The intuitive graphical environment of LabVIEW revolutionized the way engineers and scientists work, much like the spreadsheet provided a new way for financial professionals to do their jobs. When combined with continuously improving computer-based measurement hardware, LabVIEW programs, known as “virtual instruments,” create measurement systems that work at ever-increasing frequencies and resolutions.
As National Instruments has grown from a three-man team to a global organization with more than 3,100 employees, Truchard has led the company with a conservative, deliberate approach that has yielded steady company success. He has incited innovation, growth, and expansion in a highly successful, worldwide enterprise while maintaining the entrepreneurial spirit that spurred the start of the company. As a result, National Instruments has seen 26 years of growth in its 27-year history.
Truchard’s long-term course for National Instruments equally balances the success of its customers, employees, shareholders, and suppliers. Truchard and his management team have created such a winning corporate culture that FORTUNE magazine has named National Instruments as one of the 100 Best Companies to Work For in America for the past five years.
Truchard also is a recognized industry leader. In 2003, he was elected to the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences. In 2002, a leading electronics publication, Electronic Design, inducted Truchard into its Engineering Hall of Fame and in 2001, a global market consulting firm, Frost & Sullivan, honored him as the CEO of the Year for the test and measurement industry. In addition, Worth magazine named him one of best CEOs for three consecutive years, emphasizing his focus on long-term growth and innovation.
While successfully directing the company's innovation of
industry-leading software and hardware, Truchard also participates in many
community organizations. He is a member and former chairman of the Engineering
Foundation Advisory Council, works closely with The University of Texas at
Austin as a member of the Chancellor's Council, and is a former member of the
university's Electrical and Computer Engineering Visiting Committee. He is a
founding member of the Austin Software Council and was a member of Texas Gov.
Rick Perry's Advisory Council on the Digital Economy. Truchard also is an active
supporter of the National Instruments ROBOLAB program, which, in conjunction
with Tufts University and the Pitsco LEGO Educational Division, seeks to
introduce students from kindergarten through high school to basic engineering
and computing skills.
Before founding NI, Truchard worked as managing director of the acoustical
measurements division at Applied Research Laboratories at The University of
Texas at Austin. Truchard holds a doctorate in electrical engineering, as well
as a Master of Science and Bachelor of Science in physics, all from The
University of Texas at Austin.
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Johnny Charles Wachel, P.E. B.S.M.E. 1957, M.S.M.E 1959 Retired President, Engineering Dynamics, Inc. |
Johnny C. “Buddy” Wachel’s combination of technical prowess and entrepreneurial acumen led him to become one of the most recognized and successful figures in mechanical vibration problems.
Wachel grew up in East Texas and attended Kilgore College, graduating in 1954 with an associate’s degree. After transferring to The University of Texas at Austin, he earned his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering, accepted a teaching assistantship and completed his master’s degree in the same field. Upon graduating, he worked for two years at Texas Instruments before joining Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) in 1961. At SwRI, he performed research on vibrations of piping systems and two kinds of large compressor units, developing many procedures and calculation methods that are still used in the industry today.
By 1967, Wachel was a full-time consultant solving vibration and failure problems in existing compressor, pump and piping systems. Many of these compressor failures were caused by non-synchronous vibrations due to higher compressor speeds and pressures, and Wachel quickly became a recognized expert in this area. Between 1972 and 1978, he investigated numerous instability problems, which led him to develop the Wachel Equation for accurately estimating the destabilizing forces in compressors, ultimately improving the correlation between design calculations and measurements.
As a section manager at SwRI, Wachel developed and managed a group of specialists to perform vibration studies. He and his group emerged as universally respected engineering vibration consultants and preferred resources for companies in the United States and abroad. Combining this expertise with his entrepreneurial spirit, Wachel co-founded Engineering Dynamics, Inc., (EDI) in San Antonio in 1982, where he was president and manager of engineering until his retirement in 1997.
With Wachel’s experienced guidance, EDI quickly became known for its superior-quality work in solving difficult vibration and pulsation problems and performing meticulous design audits. EDI made an important breakthrough by developing digital computer techniques to simulate acoustical pulsation characteristics of gases and liquids in piping systems of compressors and pumps – a valuable and unique technological advance for the petrochemical, nuclear and other industries. EDI become recognized throughout the world as a source to perform pulsation design studies of compressor and pump installations and to develop solutions for pulsation-induced vibration and failure problems.
Believing knowledge should be shared, Wachel and his staff published many of the case histories about the field vibration and failure problems they had solved. In addition to the publication of more than 50 technical papers, Wachel also shared his experience by teaching engineering seminars on vibrations and pulsations around the world.
During his career, Wachel received several honors and awards, most notably the ASME Fellow award in 1989 and the Life Fellow award in 2003. The ASME Petroleum Division awarded Wachel the Eugene Jacobson Award for the best all-around paper in the field of mechanical engineering in 1985. Wachel also served on the ASME O&M 3 Nuclear Code -- Subgroup on Piping Vibrations committee for more than 20 years. Always loyal to The University of Texas and the College of Engineering, Wachel is a member of Friends of Alec, Tau Beta Pi, Pi Tau Sigma, the Longhorn Foundation and a lifetime member of the Texas Exes.