Eimer 1206, BHM 1328.
58mm. Bronze. By J.S. & A.B. Wyon, after W.Wyon (later type issued by John Pinches).
Obverse with bust of Telford, reverse showing view of the Menai suspension bridge. Edge engraved 'Mary Patricia Kendrick, B.A (Associate)'. This medal was awarded in 1964.
Good Extremely Fine and housed in John Pinches case of issue. An important medal to a very important female engineer.
Mary Patricia Kendrick MBE born Mary Patricia Boak (2 May 1928 – 8 June 2015) was a British tidal engineer who was an expert on silt. She worked on many projects but she is known for leading a team working on the Thames Barrier. She broke a 200 year long list of Admirals who looked after keeping the River Mersey navigable when she was appointed Acting Conservator of the River Mersey - a role that dates back to 1625.
Her first job was at the UK government's Hydraulics Research Station (HRS) at Wallingford. She modestly applied for a job as a secretary and it was the interviewer who decided she should be an Assistant Experimental Officer. Her first task was to study the increasing silt building up in the River Mersey.
In 1964 she was the only female senior manager at the Hydraulic Research Station where she had a team of ten people (all men). That year she won the Telford Medal (this very medal) given annually by the Institution of Civil Engineers for the paper ‘Field and model investigations into the reasons for siltation in the Mersey estuary’, co-authored in 1963 with her colleague (William) Alan Price and published in the Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers. She was the first woman to be given this honour.
Kendrick died in Henley-on-Thames in 2015.