Chapter History

Since 1987, our members have organized and fulfilled the duties of our Society for the greater benefit of the engineering profession and engineering education. For 30 years we have been successful at recruiting new members, maintaining the Chapter Board and volunteering our time and donating money to see that the future of engineering in our area continues to thrive and be a highly sought after career. Many thanks go out to our founding members, many who are still actively participating and attending events. We are also grateful for all of our members who have been faithful in their memberships and sponsorship and choose to support this Chapter financially. It was in August of 1987 that Michael T. Hermesmeyer and Richard T. Creech traveled to FES Headquarters in Tallahassee with a signed petition to establish the Treasure Coast Chapter. There was about 30 original members who signed the petition. Our Chapter quickly became involved at the State level defending legislation to protect our environment, agriculture, and engineering law. Locally, we created our first fund raising and scholarship event: The FES Annual Golf Tournament.

As the years rolled by our Chapter grew towards 100 members. We established our annual events such as:

  • The Golf Tournament
  • The Engineers Banquet (E-Week – Discover-E)
  • The Scholarship Banquet
  • MathCOUNTS
  • The Fishing Tournament

And as the baton was passed from president-to-president the kinship of our engineering community deepened. Even in the face of economic down-turn our chapter remained vigilant. As some may recall the famous, “Grease-Fire Speech” which reinvigorated the Chapter to continue to push forward. Our traditions have carried through the tests of time. 

Chapter Growth

Our Chapter has maintained a medium membership size for many years, which is about 80 to 90 members. The yellow bar on the chart below is the 100 member goal to be considered a large sized chapter. Fact: 35% of our members have been members for over 20 years.

Chapter Demographics 2019

We have a strong presence on the Treasure Coast but remember, our Region stretches west to Okeechobee and Sebring of Highlands County. We strive to see our Chapter reaching to better include these areas in scholarships and events.