Esteemed Mechanical Engineer
Educated, Martin Luther University and University of Karlsruhe, Germany, Friedrich Paul Johannes Rimrott, born, Halle, Germany, 1927, arrived as a mechanical engineer aboard the M.V. Italia, Pier 21, Halifax, 1952. With $50 in his pocket, Fred soon learned that if he was going to continue with engineering in Canada it would be wise to pursue a post graduate education. By 1955, Fred graduated, University of Toronto, M.A. Sc., and thence travelled to Pennsylvania to pursue his Ph.D. at Penn State University in Engineering Mechanics. By the time he had finished a Postdoctoral Fellow at École Polytechnique, Montreal, 1960, the University of Toronto invited Dr. Rimrott to be Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering. It was a lifelong association in which Dr. Rimrott became well-known, both nationally and internationally, in Theoretical and Applied Mechanics. When he retired, 1993, as Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering, University of Toronto, Dr. Rimrott had served the Toronto school since 1967 as full Professor. In 1980, Dr. Rimrott became President, 15th International Congress of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics. In earlier years, Dr. Rimrott gathered together a group of like-minded engineers in Canada to form the Canadian Congress of Applied Mechanics. Better known as CANCAM, their meetings have been held biannually ever since he became Founding Chairman, 1967. Dr. Rimrott also organized and chaired the first Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering, 1990. Recipient of Honorary Degrees from University of Victoria, British Columbia, University of St. Petersburg, Russia, and University of Magdeburg, Germany, F.P.J. Rimrott’s immigration to Canada, 1952, has helped to spotlight Canada as a world leader in Mechanical Engineering. Winner of the prestigious Alexander von Humbolt Research Prize, and either author or co-author of several major publications in Dynamics, Dr. Rimrott, left, in this view, visits with Nguyen Van Khang, distinguished professor at University of Hanoi, while in Halong Bay, Vietnam, 1995. [Photo, courtesy Professor F.P.J. Rimrott]