Engineering Firm

A Virginia-based electrical engineering firm is opening a 43-employee office in Baltimore with plans to expand in the next few years. M.C. Dean Inc. said it will have a grand-opening event next week at its new facility, a former warehouse on Ostend Street in the city's Sharp-Leadenhall neighborhood. The company expects to increase its employment there to as many as 75 jobs in the next two years. jhopkins@baltsun.com twitter.com/realestatewonk Text BUSINESS to 70701 to get Baltimore Sun Business text alerts

A Virginia-based electrical engineering firm is opening a 43-employee office in Baltimore with plans to expand in the next few years. M.C. Dean Inc. said it will have a grand-opening event next week at its new facility, a former warehouse on Ostend Street in the city's Sharp-Leadenhall neighborhood. The company expects to increase its employment there to as many as 75 jobs in the next two years. jhopkins@baltsun.com twitter.com/realestatewonk Text BUSINESS to 70701 to get Baltimore Sun Business text alerts

Chad R. Edmondson, civil engineer, has joined McCrone's development engineering department at their Annapolis headquarters. The engineering, environmental consulting, land planning, and surveying firm has eight offices serving municipal, private and industrial clients throughout the mid-Atlantic region.Edmondson is a graduate of civil engineering from the Florida Institute of Technology. He joins McCrone in Annapolis from their Easton office, where he was involved in commercial and residential civil site design and development projects throughout the Delmarva Peninsula.

Gill-Simpson Inc., a Baltimore-based electrical engineering and construction firm, on Monday said it had bought a Pennsylvania company that specializes in providing services to the energy infrastructure market. The firm, which traces its roots to 1932, bought Hopwood, Pa.-based W.R. Casteel Co., which employs 110 people. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. W.R. Casteel has customers in the renewable energy, industrial and utility, and commercial and institutional fields. Text BUSINESS to 70701 to get Baltimore Sun Business text alerts

The county is suing an Aberdeen engineering firm for $145,000, contending that construction of the Hickory Park Recreation Complex was delayed because the civil engineers did not do a required wetlands study before construction began.The suit, filed Feb. 25 in Harford Circuit Court by Richard G. Herbig and Paula S. Etting, assistant county attorneys, alleges that Windward Associates Inc. of the first block of Parke St. in Aberdeen was negligent and breached its 1989 contract with the county by failing to determine the boundaries of wetlands within the planned complex.

Dorothea K. Lanier, 88, engineering firm officer Dorothea K. Lanier, a homemaker and an engineering firm officer, died Wednesday of complications of Alzheimer's disease at Gerstenberg Hospice Center in Palm Beach, Fla. She was 88 and had lived in Pikesville before moving to Dunedin, Fla., in 1969. Born Dorothea Kaltenbaugh in Johnstown, Pa., she moved to Pikesville in the 1940s and lived on Deerfield Road. In 1940 she married James T. Lanier Sr. and ran the office and did bookkeeping for Lanier Engineering Sales, a Brooklyn Park business they owned.

John F. Grice, chairman of a Towson engineering firm, died July 30 of lung cancer at the Greater Baltimore Medical Center. He was 69.At his death, he was chairman of the board of Henry Adams Inc., consulting engineers, where he began his career in 1952. Earlier, he had been president and treasurer of the company.Born in Pittsburgh, he moved to Baltimore in 1931 and was educated in city schools. He was a 1943 graduate of Polytechnic Institute and earned his bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in 1946, completing the course in three years.

W. Edward Deacon, a retired executive of a mechanical engineering firm, died of a respiratory ailment Saturday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. The Towson resident was 90. Born in Baltimore and raised on Patterson Park Avenue, he was a 1931 graduate of Polytechnic Institute. During World War II, Mr. Deacon did classified work at the former Glenn L. Martin Co. aircraft plant in Middle River. He joined Power and Combustion Inc. in 1950, and retired in 1984 as its vice president. He was a member of Waverly Lodge of the Masons and the Engineering Society of Baltimore.

Lawrence E. Jones, a civil engineer and founder of a Towson engineering firm, died of pulmonary hypertension Friday at Great Baltimore Medical Center. He was 65. Mr. Jones was born in Hornell, N.Y., and moved with his family to the Baltimore area, where he was raised in Aero Acres in Middle River and later in the city's Northwood neighborhood. He was a 1956 graduate of Polytechnic Institute and earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in civil engineering from the University of Maryland.

Kenneth Armstrong McCord, who helped design Columbia's water and sewage infrastructure, died of complications from kidney failure Friday at his Towson home. He was 80. Mr. McCord, a former managing partner at the architectural and engineering firm of Whitman, Requardt and Associates, also helped plan the water and sewage services for Richmond, Va., Joppatowne and Ocean City. Born in Baltimore, he graduated from Polytechnic Institute. He attended the Johns Hopkins University and earned an engineering degree in 1941.

A Westminster man with a 20-year criminal record went to jail Thursday for faking a state seal on engineering credentials to get a job with a Columbia company. A contrite Lawrence D. Novakowski, 52, got an 18-month sentence in the Howard County Detention Center with a chance for work release. Novakowski had pleaded guilty in April. A complaint by an engineering firm in Baltimore County triggered the state investigation that led to Novakowski's conviction. Investigators found he had used a counterfeited public seal to show he was a licensed Maryland engineer.

Baltimore's Washington Monument, the first civic monument to the nation's first president, has been closed to the public until further notice because of safety concerns. Public officials closed the midtown landmark Friday "as a precaution to citizens," according to Cathy Powell, a spokeswoman for Baltimore's Department of General Services. Powell and Gwendolyn Burrell, a spokeswoman for the city's Department of Recreation and Parks, said they could not say when the monument will reopen.

John C. Burdette Jr., a retired electrical engineer and co-founder and partner in the Baltimore engineering firm of Burdette, Kohler, Murphy & Associates Inc., died of complications from diabetes Dec. 7 at his Glenarm home. He was 88. Born in Baltimore, the son of a B&O Railroad mechanical engineer and a homemaker, Mr. Burdette was raised in Edmondson Village. He was a 1939 graduate of City College and earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering in 1943 from the Johns Hopkins University.

A 51-year-old Westminster man has been charged with using fake credentials to get hired as a professional engineer by at least three firms in Maryland, the state Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation said Tuesday. A Howard County grand jury returned a three-count indictment charging Lawrence D. Novakowski, 51, with one count of practicing without a license and two counts of counterfeiting a public seal, according to the State Board for Professional Engineers, a part of the labor department's division of occupational and professional licensing that investigated.

Roland Talmadge Talton Jr., former owner of a Baltimore engineering firm, died Nov. 6 of cardiac and respiratory failure at Upper Chesapeake Bay Medical Center. The longtime Bel Air resident was 89. Born and raised in Pocomoke City, the son of a B&O railroader and a homemaker, Mr. Talton was a 1937 graduate of Pocomoke High School. During World War II, he joined the Army Air Forces and served as an instructor with the 88th Bomb Group. Mr. Talton attended the University of Virginia and Georgetown University.

Donald J. Schuerholz, a retired co-owner of a Baltimore consulting engineering firm and a former captain of the University of Maryland men's basketball team, died of heart failure May 2 at the Fairhaven Health Care Center in Sykesville. The former Ellicott City resident was 86. His father, William Schuerholz, who coached the Loyola College men's basketball team from 1912 to 1926, had 10 children. Donald Schuerholz's elder brother, Gilbert, was an All-American soccer goaltender. His nephew is Atlanta Braves President John Schuerholz.

William G. Robertson Jr., a retired president of a Baltimore engineering firm and Planned Parenthood volunteer, died of heart failure Sunday at his winter home in Naples, Fla. The Lutherville resident was 93. Mr. Robertson was born and raised in Baltimore and was a 1931 graduate of Polytechnic Institute. He worked at Bethlehem Steel Corp. while attending night classes at the Johns Hopkins University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in civil engineering. He began his career in 1947 as a consulting engineer with Henry Adams Inc., an electrical and mechanical engineering company, and was named the company's president in 1960.

A Westminster man with a 20-year criminal record went to jail Thursday for faking a state seal on engineering credentials to get a job with a Columbia company. A contrite Lawrence D. Novakowski, 52, got an 18-month sentence in the Howard County Detention Center with a chance for work release. Novakowski had pleaded guilty in April. A complaint by an engineering firm in Baltimore County triggered the state investigation that led to Novakowski's conviction. Investigators found he had used a counterfeited public seal to show he was a licensed Maryland engineer.

Robert Gamble James, a retired civil engineer who was a founding partner of a Towson engineering firm, died of a pulmonary hemorrhage April 20 at Upper Chesapeake Medical Center. He was 76 and lived in Bel Air. Mr. James was born and raised in Detroit, where he graduated in 1951 from Mackenzie High School. He earned a civil engineering degree in 1955 from Wayne State University and a master's degree in the discipline from Michigan State University in 1966. After serving in the Army in the late 1950s, he went to work as a civil engineer for the city of Detroit.

Charles Alvin Diver, a civil engineer and World War II veteran, died of a stroke Jan. 24 at Oak Crest Village retirement community in Parkville. He was 86. Mr. Diver, who was born in Baltimore and raised in the Hamilton neighborhood, graduated from Polytechnic Institute. In 1942, he earned a bachelor's degree in engineering from the Johns Hopkins University. He was commissioned by the Army Corps of Engineers on the day of his graduation, and he served in Algeria, Tunisia, Italy, France and Germany, attaining the rank of major.