erosion reports prepared in the District offices before their formal transmittal to the 

 seven-member BEB for final consideration and action. To further assist the Districts in this 

 transfer of assignment, the BEB also conducted classes "to train technical personnel in the 

 establishment and latest techniques in coastal engineering."^"^ Not only did engineers from 

 both the Corps' Districts and Divisions attend tliese classes but so too did new employees on 

 tlie BEB's own technical staff, plus several engineers from State agencies. One of the 

 valuable results of this procedural change in report preparation was that it helped to spread 

 both interest in, and knowledge of, coastal problems among a far larger group of people. 



The quest for greater expansion of the BEB's contribution to the field of coastal 

 engineering, a quest which epitomized the postwar years, brought two further 

 developments. The first of these was involvement of the agency in both overseas 

 consultation on beach-related problems, as well as participation in international meetings. 

 Although overseas consulting had really started during World War II, Jay Y. Hall, Jr., and 

 Harold A. Ward's trip to Puerto Rico in 1945 is generally considered as the beginning of 

 these efforts. (A Usting of BEB staff and members' overseas consulting work and 



attendance at international meetings can be found in Appendix D.) This activity was 

 expanded in the 1950's and wiU be discussed further in the section dealing with that period, 

 as well the subject of international meetings. 



The second development was the issuance of the "Bulletin of the Beach Erosion Board" 

 which began in April 1947. This event should not be regarded as a direct result of the 

 publishing provision of Public Law 166 of 1945, for legislation passed 9 years previously 

 had also contained a similar directive. Rather, the pubUcation of the BEB Bulletin is perhaps 

 better explained by the fervor of the times. As staied in the Foreword of the first issue: 



"It was felt by the Board that a quarterly bulletin* should be included among the 

 publications of the Board, in order to disseminate timely information regarding 

 research activities, cooperative beach erosion studies, and other items of interest 

 to agencies concerned with the problem of beach erosion."^ ^* 



The contents of the Bulletin clearly demonstrate the Board's desire to do what it 

 said— disseminate timely information on coastal matters. For example, up to about 1953, 

 the Bulletin contained a listing of recent acquisitions to tlie BEB's Ubrary. These 

 publications were available on a 30-day loan basis. Significant items from the scientific 

 literature on coastal matters written in languages other than EngUsh and which had been 

 translated, were also printed in the Bulletin. A case in point was the work of Ramon 

 Iribarren Cavanilles. Several papers vratten by this prominent Spanish coastal engineer were 

 obtained through the efforts of Richard O. Eaton, with the actual translation made at tlie 

 University of California, Berkeley.^^^ Then beginning in April 1952, the Bulletin began to 

 carry progress reports of the research which was being done under the BEB contract 

 program, as well as reports concerning its own in-house research activities. 



*In 1956, the Bulletin was changed from a quarterly to an annual publication, with distribution in July of each 

 year. 



70 



