NASHVILLE, Tenn. (Aug. 24, 2022) – Linda Adcock, who managed the Center Hill Dam Safety Rehabilitation Project before retiring in 2019, received the Distinguished Civilian Employee Recognition Award today highlighting exceptional achievements with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Nashville District.
In unveiling a brass nameplate outside the executive office and then in making the award presentation, Lt. Col. Joseph Sahl, Nashville District commander, praised Adcock for making a very positive impact on multiple projects and assigned duties over the span of 38 years of federal service.
Sahl said Adcock’s contributions working in planning and dam safety and as a project manager will continue to pay dividends for the nation for many years to come, and that the impact of her significant contributions is what this award is meant to recognize.
“For us it is the most prestigious award that we can present,” said Sahl. “Seriously, it really speaks volumes to the contributions of the employee, but it’s also the character that is looked at when we want somebody represented on our wall.”
Adcock worked hard to build a sterling reputation during her career. She started in the Hydraulics and Hydrology Branch in December 1980 as a student in the Cooperative Education Program at Tennessee Technological University. Following her graduation in 1983, she joined the Plan Formulation Section in the Planning Branch.
She excelled over the years in challenging assignments and roles within Planning, Dam Safety, and Project Management. Projects that she supported include the first Mill Creek Reconnaissance and Feasibility Studies; Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area Project; City of Cullman, Alabama, Water Supply Needs Analysis; and Kentucky Lock Feasibility Study.
The projects she supported have had local, regional and national significance by providing solutions in local flood protection, regional navigational needs, national recreational opportunities, and dam safety affecting large at-risk populations.
Even with a resume worthy of high praise and acknowledgement, Adcock said she couldn’t believe it when she learned of her selection for this recognition.
“I am humbled and honored to be on a board downstairs with leaders that I have considered Titans of the Nashville District,” Adcock said during the award ceremony.
In the years leading up to her retirement, Adcock led a multi-disciplined project delivery team that spearheaded construction efforts on a mega project to stop seepage at Center Hill Dam in Lancaster, Tennessee, and an auxiliary dam nearby in Silver Point. Under her leadership the PDT analyzed, designed and constructed grouting, barrier walls, and a roller compacted concrete berm.
The first phase of the project to rehabilitate Center Hill Dam involved grouting along the left rim of the dam, a project completed in 2010. In 2012, work began to install 200,000 square feet of concrete panels and columns into the embankment. The Nashville District celebrated the completion of phase two of the project May 18, 2015.
At the phase two completion ceremony, Adcock explained that the Corps of Engineers had installed a 2.5-feet thick concrete barrier wall vertically along the embankment in overlapping rectangular columns as deep as 308 feet from the top of the dam and deep into the solid-rock foundation. The barrier wall provided the permanent ‘barrier’ to potentially harmful seepage beneath the main dam earthen embankment.
During the third and final phase of the mega project, Adcock managed construction of a roller compacted concrete berm that would stand 125-feet wide by 800-feet long to reinforce the auxiliary dam. At the same time, she led the rehabilitation of the 70-year-old electrical and mechanical components for the dam’s spillway gates.
Adcock retired shortly before the completion of the RCC berm, but accepted an invitation to join other distinguished guests July 1, 2020, to cut a ribbon at the auxiliary dam signifying the completion of the berm and the overarching dam safety rehabilitation project that she had supported for so many years.
Adcock said she couldn’t have balanced the work on the projects with her home life without her husband Ricky. She thanked him for his encouragement and help raising their children when she spent long hours at work and away from home. She also expressed her appreciation for other friends and family in attendance for their unconditional love and support, to her parents for instilling a strong work ethic, and to teammates in the Nashville District that worked hard in support of projects she managed like the mega project at Center Hill Dam.
“As I think back over my career, the Corps gives you great responsibility and interesting work, but it’s the relationships that matter the most,” Adcock said. “When you see my name on that board, your name is among those letters too,” she added in regard to all the people who played a role in her success.
Nashville District civilian retirees with at least 20 years of service are eligible to be nominated for the Distinguished Civilian Employee Recognition Award. The recognition is reserved for exceptional retirees who have served honorably and contributed substantially to the reputation of the Corps of Engineers.
The Nashville District has now honored a total of 52 retirees with this award since the district’s inception in 1888. Every recipient has a nameplate added to a bronze plaque at the headquarters to honor the employee’s distinguished career.
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