David Herbert Pilgrim
David Herbert Pilgrim was born at Arncliffe, Sydney, in 1931, and grew up in Brighton.
His schooling was first at Brighton Public School and then two years at Hurstville Opportunity School. High school years were spent at Sydney Technical High School, tat that time at Paddington.
His interest in the area of hydrology probably started when he was at Hurstville Opportunity School in 5th or 6th class. Here he was involved in a project on the Sydney Water Board. At the end of high school he applied for a job with the Irrigation Commission an while undertaking a cadetship with the WCIC Pilgrim studied at the University of NSW from 1949 and in 1952 graduated with honours and shared the University Medal with Eric Laurenson. The structure of the NSW Water Conservation and Irrigation Commission cadetship included was six months academic study, one month exams and five months industrial experience each year.
Pilgrim spent the first year’s field experience at Keepit Dam near Gunnedah, the second year was spent in the design office of the Commission and the third year’s field experience was spent at the Albury office of the Hydrographic Branch of the Commission investigating stream flow measurement in the Snowy Mountains.
After six years with the WC&IC he was encouraged to move to a role at the university, initially teaching concrete technology as there was an oversupply of teachers in water engineering. In parallel with lecturing, he undertook PhD investigations into the concentration of water in flood events. This work involved using radioactive isotopes to track runoff and resulted in the award of the degree in 1969. He was married in 1956 and his wife assisted in his field research.
From 1963 his lecturing concentrated on hydrology and his most important and continuing contribution was the publication of Australian Rainfall and Runoff in its several revisions and developments. In 1968 he worked at Stanford University and in 1975 became a senior lecturer in civil engineering at the University of NSW and for the last seven of his 35 year career at the university, Professor and Head of the Department of Water Engineering.
On Queen’s Birthday 1988 Pilgrim was made a Member of the Order of Australia, ‘for service to science, particularly in the field of hydrology.’
David Herbert Pilgrim died in 2015.
For a view of Pilgrim’s life and work by Engineers Australia water Engineering ‘Hall of Fame’ see:
David Pilgrim has an entry in Wikipedia:
http://www.history-of-hydrology.net/mediawiki/index.php?title=Pilgrim,_David_H
To access an oral history interview with David Herbert Pilgrim please use this link:'
https://heritage.engineersaustralia.org.au/wiki/Oral_Histories_Sydney
