From automating the insertion of toys into Cracker Jack boxes to inventing an air-powered meat tenderizer, Clifford E. “Cliff” Evanson distinguished himself as a pioneer in the field of automation.
He was co-founder and president of TAB Engineers Inc., originally known as Technical Automation Business Engineers, which handled more than 2,000 projects and developed automated production lines for everything from candy and bacon to brick and metal hinges.
Patents for many of the systems are held jointly in Mr. Evanson’s name and the names of companies for which he invented the machinery. But Mr. Evanson never bragged, working instead to raise the stature of the consulting engineering profession.
Mr. Evanson, 85, died on Sunday, Sept. 19, at his home in Lake Barrington Shores of complications from colon cancer.
“He wasn’t one of those people who walked into a room and said: `Oh look at me. Here I am.’ He was always listening to what people had to say, always absorbing,” said his wife of 27 years, Ann. “He could talk to you about the White Sox and Cubs. He could talk to you about Socrates. He could talk on any topic without you feeling like he was lecturing.”
A native of Kansas City, Mo., Mr. Evanson grew up on the North Side of Chicago during the Great Depression. He earned his mechanical engineering degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1942 through five years of night classes while working 58 hours a week at the Link-Belt Ordinance Co. during World War II.
Mr. Evanson was elected to Tau Beta Pi, a national engineering honor society, for his high grades. He married Thelma Magel in 1942 and was married to her for 33 years until she died in 1975.
In 1951, his consulting company designed the first successful rotary boring and mining machine for James S. Robbins Sr., founder of the Ohio-based Robbins Co., which manufactures tunneling and mining equipment. That machine became the prototype for the Robbins boring machines that dug the Chicago “deep tunnel” system to handle excess storm water.
Mr. Evanson was part of a group that formed the Consulting Engineers Council in the mid-1950s, now known as the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC), headquartered in Washington. In 1964, he became the first president of what is now the ACEC of Illinois. That same year, Mr. Evanson also became the first independent consultant selected by the U.S. Department of Commerce as a representative to the U.S. Trade Show in Tokyo, where he explained the operations of American production machines.
“America’s unique ability to design and build large or small machines for practically any purpose must be stressed in foreign markets,” Mr. Evanson told the Tribune in 1964 after returning from the show. He was asked to repeat his performance at the 1965 U.S. Trade Show in Germany for European buyers.
He was elected president of the National Council of the ACEC and was honored as a fellow and life member in 1985.
“While he joined lots of organizations, he always found himself gravitating toward leadership positions,” stepson Rick Valicenti said. “… People felt like he was their advocate.”
In 1991, Mr. Evanson retired to Hilton Head Island, S.C., where he became involved with the Corridor Review Committee, which worked to ensure that the island’s beauty was not compromised by new construction. He later moved to Lake Barrington Shores, where he became president of his condominium association and led the Great Books discussion group of Barrington.
Mr. Evanson is also survived by two other stepchildren, Barbara and William Valicenti, and four grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 3 p.m. Saturday at the Lake Barrington Shores Recreation Center, 64 Old Barn Rd.
