In Part One of this recap, I described how the plans unfolded for Research On the Road’s trip to our alumni chapter in Puerto Rico, and shared the details of the talk given by Iliana Baums, a Penn State faculty member and marine biologist. In this final installment, I describe our day trip with chapter members, a journey out on the ocean to get a hands-on –or “hands off!” in the case of coral–experience of the marine life of Puerto Rico.
Bright and early the next day, we set out from the marina in Fajardo on a power catamaran heading for the islands that make up the Cordillera Keys Nature Preserve, including Icacos, Palomino and Palominito.
Sometimes all signs point in a certain direction. So it was last winter when I met with folks from the Alumni Association to begin planning our spring semester “Research On The Road” events. They mentioned that the alumni chapter in Puerto Rico is rapidly growing, with hundreds of Penn State grads on the island, and increasingly active membership programming. I left that meeting (bundled up against the cold and snow) pondering their enthusiastic suggestion to bring ROTR to Penn State’s hopping Caribbean alumni group.
Just hours later, I happened upon a Penn State video about the work of Iliana Baums, associate professor of molecular ecology in Penn State’s biology department. Trained at the University of Miami and the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, Baums focuses her work on the coral reefs of the Caribbean and, in particular, has ongoing research projects on Elkhorn corals in Puerto Rico.
Those are the academic disciplines that launched the last seven Penn State presidents on their careers in higher education. To be sure, each had transitioned to administration before taking the reigns as the University’s chief executive. But each also has left his mark as a researcher.
I started thinking about the President as Researcher when I read a biographical sketch of Eric Barron, who recently took office as Penn State’s 18th president. Barron first came to the University in 1986 as director of the Earth System Science Center. Earlier, he had been a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Colorado and subsequent to leaving Penn State, he served for two years as NCAR’s director. He’s authored more than 125 peer-reviewed papers in geology, oceanography, and climate issues.
So what about other six presidents?
Barron’s immediate predecessor, Rod Erickson (2011-14), is a bit of a hybrid when it comes to scholarly research. He came to Penn State in 1977 as a geographer, the discipline in which he holds a Ph.D. But his interest in economic geography and regional economic development led to his appointment as professor of both geography and business administration in 1984. In the Smeal College of Business, he directed the Center for Regional Business Analysis and was associate director of the Division of Research. His interdisciplinary approach to research served him well as Penn State’s Vice President for Research from 1997 to 1999.
Graham Spanier (1995-2011), a family sociologist and demographer, is the author of more than a hundred scholarly publications, including 10 books. He also is the founding editor of the Journal of Family Issues, a peer-reviewed research publication.
Spanier was preceded by a biologist, Joab Thomas (1990-95). Hard to believe, but he’s the only Penn State president to have a fossilized pollen named for him. He completed his dissertation at Harvard on that pollen, now named “joabthomasii,” and his research work there and later at the University of Alabama won him international distinction as a specialist in the family Cyrillaceae.
Bryce Jordan (1983-90) is an accomplished flutist and holds a doctorate in musicology from the University of North Carolina. In the 1960s, he directed graduate studies in music at the University of Maryland, before moving into administration at other universities.
Penn State had a plant pathologist-president in John Oswald (1970-83). As a member of the faculty at the University of California Berkeley in the 1950s, his published research included such subjects as fungus root rots, plant viral diseases (particularly of cereals and potatoes) and the fundamentals of the serology of plant viruses. In 1951 he discovered the Barley Yellow Dwarf, since recognized as one of the world’s principal cereal diseases. He became chairman of the department of plant pathology at Berkeley, and then followed an administrative path for the remainder of his career.
Eric Walker (1956-70) was a Harvard-educated electrical engineer and during World War II directed that institution’s Underwater Sound Lab, where researchers helped to develop sonar. Walker moved the lab (renamed the Ordnance Research Lab) to Penn State after the war but retained its focus on national defense-related research, particularly problems related to sounds made by the propellers of torpedoes and submarines. The facility later became the Applied Research Lab and broadened its work to non-defense fields. Meanwhile Walker became dean of engineering and in 1956 was all set to become Penn State’s very first vice president for research — a post created by then-President Milton Eisenhower — when Eisenhower abruptly resigned to become an adviser to his brother, U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower. Penn State’s Trustees then named Walker president, largely at Milton’s strong recommendation.
The Penn State presidents prior to Walker were an eclectic mix of teachers, administrators, even full-time clergy. Having strong research credentials was not expected of college presidents in the long ago. Only one stands out as a legitimate scholarly researcher: Evan Pugh, the University’s founding president (1859-64).
The spirit of researcher-President Evan Pugh lives on in the lobby of Old Main. Image: Patrick Mansell
Pugh, a chemist, held a Ph.D. from Germany’s University of Goettingen. He won international recognition for resolving a debate then raging among European scientists: did plants absorb nitrogen from the air, or from the soil? Pugh proved it was from the soil. In doing so, he became “the father of the modern fertilizer industry,” as Roger Williams (executive director of the Penn State Alumni Association and a Pugh scholar extraordinaire) likes to say. Cynics might argue that the title aptly fits a college president.
Certainly fitting was Penn State’s decision in 1960 to establish the Evan Pugh Professorships, given to faculty who, among other qualities, have earned high distinction as researchers. The Pugh Professorships are the highest honor the University bestows on its faculty; only 68 have been awarded.
I’m recently back from Steel City where Research On The Road gathered on a rainy Wednesday evening, April 30, for a quintessentially Pittsburghian night out: a talk by Penn State professor of kinesiology and history Mark Dyreson on the history of baseball.
Research On The Road headed back to Washington, DC, recently for our fourth event with the good folks from the Penn State Alumni Chapter of Greater DC. The speaker? The multifaceted political science faculty member Pete Hatemi, whose research on politics and genetics has been showcased on NPR, the BBC, and other outlets.
