Coming from Dallas, Texas, Francis C. Turner joined the Bureau of Public Roads in Washington, D.C., as a junior highway engineer in 1929. From that assignment, he then became actively involved in highway development from within the entire United States, Canada, The Yukon, Alaska. Philippine Islands and Northwest Territories.

In 1957 he was named Deputy Commissioner, Chief Engineer of Public Roads. The committees on which he has served nationally and internationally are too numerous to mention. His appointment by President Johnson in 1967 as Director of the Bureau of Public Roads was timely; and in 1969 when the Federal Highway Administration replaced it within the Department of Transportation, he was appointed as its administrator by President Nixon.

Just prior to his resignation in 1972, he gave an outstanding speech to the 13th Highway Transportation Congress on the future of highway needs. Many awards have been his, including the Neil J. Curry Award for “greatest contributions to progress in highway transportation.”