Ark Chin

Life Member 2006February 9, 1924 – November 13, 2011Born in a small village in Tai Shan, China, Ark Geow Chin came to the US at the age of 10 and worked in his father's Chinese restaurant in Aberdeen while attending school. He began studies at the University of Washington, then left school to fight in WWII, in the European theater with the 100th infantry. Promoted to Sergeant and twice wounded, he received Purple Heart and Bronze Star decorations.

After the war he settled in Seattle and returned to the UW where he earned the BSCE in 1950 and the MSCE in 1952, honored by Tau Beta Pi, Sigma Xi, and Phi Beta Kappa.

He joined the consulting engineering firm Cary & Kramer -- later Kramer, Chin & Mayo -- eventually becoming the firm's president, chief executive officer and chairman of the board 1972-89. The firm earned national recognition in the field of pollution control, water resources, institutional architecture, fisheries resources and aquaculture. Among high-visibility projects, the Seattle Aquarium and the West Seattle high-rise bridge stand out among prized designs.

In a 1998 Seattle Times editorial, Wes Uhlman wrote: "Ark Chin is singularly the person in Seattle who is most responsible for the Seattle Aquarium. In the early 1970s, when we discovered that the voter-approved bond issue did not contain sufficient dollars for a waterfront aquarium, I called Ark Chin into my office (I was then Seattle's mayor) for advice. He agreed to take on the project and manage it in its entirety. This is quite unusual inasmuch as the usual practice is to place such a project under the aegis of an architect. Ark Chin brought the project to completion within budget. He and his firm had never done an aquarium project before. The finished product was a superb state-of-the-art, world-class aquarium for its time, prompting visitors from many cities and countries to visit and emulate it. From that experience, Ark Chin and his firm went on to become international experts, building and advising aquaria all over the world."

Beyond his passion for his work, Ark pursued his vision through community service and philanthropy. A tribute by the Wing Luke Museum notes that in the mid-1950s Ark and Wing Luke and other first-generation bilingual Chinese Americans known as the "Young Turks" "invent[ed] a hybrid of old and new ideas to bring the Chinese American community into a modern next level." A strong believer in education as the pathway to opportunity and success in life, he served as a Chairman and Trustee on the Western Washington University Board of Regents 1974-1980, and also on the Board of Regents for the University of Washington 1998-2004 and President of the Board 2001-2002. With his family, Ark created scholarships at both Western Washington University and the University of Washington for students in need. Ark served on the Seattle Forward Thrust Committee, the Chong Wa Benevolent Association, and the Chinese Community Service Organization, as Director of the Board of Trustees for the King County Visiting Nurses Services, and as Association President and Advisor of the Gee How Oak Tin Family Association. Ark spearheaded fund-raising to establish the Kin On Nursing Home in Seattle, which serves the Asian elderly. He also built an orphanage in China not far from his home village.

Recognition of Ark’s work included: ACEC Engineer of the Year 1987, First Citizen of Seattle by the City of Seattle in 1989, WSPE Engineer of the Year 1990, Outstanding Alumni Achievement Award from the UW College of Engineering in 1992, Spirit of America Award by the Ethnic Heritage Council in 1999. A PBS documentary “Becoming American: The Chinese Experience” features Ark, as does the anthology Asian Americans in the Twenty-First Century, edited by Joann Faung Jean Lee.

Posted March 2012