Clifford Milburn Holland

Holland was born in Somerset, Massachusetts.[1] He was the only child of Edward John Holland and Lydia Frances Hood.[3] He attended Cambridge Latin School.[4] Holland graduated from Harvard University with a B.A. in 1905 and a B.S. in Civil Engineering in 1906.[3] On November 5, 1908, he married Anna Coolidge Davenport (1885–1973), who was originally from Watertown and had graduated from Radcliffe College.[5] They had four daughters.[2]

Immediately after graduation, Holland began his career in New York City working as an assistant engineer on the construction of the Joralemon Street Tunnel, after which he served as the engineer-in-charge of construction of the Clark Street Tunnel, 60th Street Tunnel, Montague Street Tunnel and 14th Street Tunnel.[1][6] Each one was built by boring out a tunnel under the bed of the river, all the while keeping it filled with compressed air so the water would not seep into it.[7] A cylinder was pushed into the tunnel to protect the workers and allowing the workers to build a cast-iron lining.[7]

Holland was the first chief engineer on the Hudson River Vehicular Tunnel project, earning an annual salary of $10,000.[8] Holland conducted experiments in a small tunnel in a coal mine in Bruceton, Pennsylvania, in order to determine how to safely and sufficiently vent vehicles' carbon monoxide out of the tunnel and keep the passengers safe.[6] Holland designed four ventilation shafts that would bring 3,500,000 cubic feet (99,000 m³) of fresh air into the tunnel every minute.[6] Construction on the tunnel began April 1, 1922, when Holland ceremoniously drove a pick into the ground at Canal and West streets in Manhattan.[9]

The stress and long hours working the tunnel project caused him to have a nervous breakdown, and he went to a sanatorium in Battle Creek, Michigan, in order to recover.[1] On October 27, 1924, Holland died of a heart attack there, at the age of 41.[1] He died one day before the final charge of dynamite connected the two tunnels.[10] At the time of his death, he lived 2416 Avenue J in Midwood, Brooklyn.[10] The funeral service was held at the Lefferts Place Chapel.[10] Milton Harvey Freeman took over chief engineer on the project after Holland's death.[11] Freeman died five months later.[11]

The project was renamed the Holland Tunnel in his memory by the New York State Bridge and Tunnel Commission and the New Jersey Interstate Bridge and Tunnel Commission on its opening day, November 12, 1924, sixteen days after Holland's death.[12] At the time it opened, the Holland Tunnel was the first vehicular tunnel in the United States and the fifth in the world.[13]

• ASCE : Clifford Milburn Holland