Durand, architect, dead at 95

This native Omahan created an award-winning pedestrian bridge.

He designed and flew airplanes, including one now displayed in the Seattle Museum of Flight.

He was the architect for a neighborhood full of homes in Bellevue, where a street is named in his honor.

And, while working at Bellevue’s Martin Bomber Plant, he modified the design of a B-29 to carry a mysterious object.

At the time, William H. Durand didn’t know that the plane — the Enola Gay — would become the first to drop an atomic bomb. Durand kept his role in the bomber’s history a secret from his family until he was 80.

He was deeply affected by the knowledge that he contributed to the bombing of Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, a son said.

“He (Durand) walked out (of the plant) a few days before the war ended. He was always conflicted about his role,” said son Roger duRand of Omaha.

William Durand — engineer, architect, professor and pilot — died March 9 at his Omaha home. He was 95 and died of natural causes, his son said.

There’s good reason Durand called his 2005 biography “Never a Dull Moment: A Life of Interesting Variety.”

“He was quite a character,” duRand said. “Dad lived a life rich in accomplishment, friendship and fun.”

Fifty years after the war ended, he stunned his family with the story of his work on the Enola Gay.

At first during the war, Durand instructed naval air cadets in meteorology and aeronautics at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

He then joined the engineering staff at the Martin Bomber Plant in Bellevue. The plant now is most widely known as the largest, historically significant structure on Offutt Air Force Base. There, Durand reconfigured the assembly line geometry to accommodate the larger B-29 Superfortress bomber after B-26 production ended there.

Then he was assigned a top-secret project: the modification of a particular B-29.

“He had to really engineer and design that plane,” duRand said. “He was told it would carry a mysterious object of a certain size and weight with connection points at various places.”

After the war, Durand returned to the Omaha University, where he taught until 1958. That’s when he took what turned out to be a permanent leave of absence to focus on the architectural and engineering business that he had begun as a sideline. The firm took on a partner and grew to 13 employees.

Hundreds of projects were completed, including residential, commercial, industrial and mechanical designs, duRand said.

One of the most widely known is the curving pedestrian bridge over Dodge Street near Memorial Park. Durand won first place in the 1968 American Institute of Steel Construction’s Prize Bridge Competition. The City Council declared the bridge a landmark in 2004.

In Bellevue, Durand designed homes for the late R. Joe Dennis and his Freeman Co. in the 1950s and ’60s.

In 1932, Durand designed and built a full-sized glider, which he piloted after being towed aloft behind the family car. It was the first of five airplanes that he designed and flew in his lifetime, his son said.

World-Herald stories detailed the construction of several of them, including one Durand built in 1939 with his father, F.P. Durand.

William Durand’s most recent plane, the duRand Mark IV, is displayed at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, his son said. In 2000, Durand was inducted into the Nebraska Aviation Hall of Fame.

Durand was a founder and long-time member of Nebraska Chapter 80 of the Experimental Aircraft Association.

Chapter 80 met for many years at the Sky Ranch, an 80-acre property northwest of Omaha that Durand acquired in 1941. He created a private airstrip and hangars there, and built the family home in 1946, duRand said.

Eventually, Sky Ranch also held Durand’s architecture and engineering office.

Durand graduated from the Omaha University with degrees in mathematics and physics and from the University of Colorado with a degree in mechanical engineering.

He became an assistant professor in Omaha University’s Engineering Department and was instrumental in establishing the Department of Aeronautics there.

Students at the University of Nebraska at Omaha now can earn degrees in aeronautics, aviation, aerospace science and technology — direct descendants of Durand’s pioneering work.

Durand closed his architecture and engineering office in 1997, selling the building and its land.

“He was as unassuming as he was brilliant. He eagerly followed every path that took his interest,” his son said. “He was fortunate to enjoy good health until the end of his life, and passed away in the home that he built and loved. He did it all his way,” duRand said.

Other survivors include son James Durand of Omaha, 10 grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.

William Durand was preceded in death by his wife of 65 years, Maurine, and his youngest son, George.

A memorial service is planned June 5 in Omaha.

Contact the writer:

444-1165, sue.truax@owh.com

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