This event is planned and organized by the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering Student Advisory Committee (WSSAC) and Is sponsored by the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering.

Pierce Merry, Jr. received a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Georgia Tech in 1950. Two months later, he joined Merry Brothers Brick and Tile Co. as a mechanical engineer and assistant department supervisor. He had spent summers at the company working as an apprentice machinist and millwright.

Merry Brothers Brick was established in 1899. In 1980 the company merged with Boral Bricks of Australia, the largest manufacturer of bricks in the world. Boral Bricks, Inc., the U. S. subsidiary, is a manufacturer and distributor of materials for the building and construction industries throughout the United States. Mr. Merry served as executive vice president of production, and later as president and chairman of the board of Boral Bricks, Inc. He retired in 1993.

Mr. Merry was a staff sergeant in the U.S. Army from 1943 to 1946. In the fall of 1946 he entered Georgia Tech, where he was in the Glee Club, belonged to Chi Phi, worked as secretary to the Music Director and as a registration aide for the Georgia Tech Evening School, and belonged to the ASME.

Mr. Merry, the grandson of Merry Brothers co-founder, Arthur H. Merry, and one of a long line of Georgia Tech graduates, has been very good to his alma mater. He was a member of the Woodruff School Advisory Board, served as vice-chairman of the 1988 ME Campaign, was chairman of the Augusta Regional Centennial Campaign, and belongs to the Georgia Tech Club of Augusta. Merry Companies contributed the bricks for the Alumni/Faculty House courtyard and wall and for the Main Campus Entrance Wall at North Avenue.

Mr. Merry is a director of the Arthur H. and Ernest B. Merry Foundation, an advisory director of Trust Company Bank of Augusta, on the Board of Directors of the Boys' and Girls' Clubs of Augusta, and a trustee of the Augusta Technical Institute and of Presbyterian College. He was a director of Merry Land and Investment Company, past president of the Augusta Chamber of Commerce, and the past director, chairman, and senior vice president of Oklahoma Brick (a subsidiary of Boral Brick),

Mr. Merry was born in Augusta, Georgia and still lives there with his wife, Lily. They have four children, seven grandchildren, and two great grandchildren.

The Woodruff Distinguished Alumnus Award was inaugurated in 1989 to recognize an outstanding alumnus of the School. Mr. Merry's name, along with other winners of the Woodruff Distinguished Alumnus Award, will be on permanent display in the lobby of the MRDC.