William Barton Rogers

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Don William Barton Rogers

Born 7 December 1804 (1804-12-07)
Virginia, USA
Died 30 May 1882 (aged 77)
Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Nationality United States
Fields Chemistry, physics, geology
Institutions College of William and Mary
University of Virginia
MIT
Alma mater College of William and Mary
Known for MIT founder
For other persons of the same name, see William Rogers.

William Barton Rogers (1804-1882) is best known for setting down the founding principles, advocating for, and finally incorporating the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1861.[1] The university opened in 1865 after the American Civil War.

Rogers attended the College of William and Mary and later served there professor of Natural Philosophy and Chemistry for eight years, succeeding his in 1828. He then served as Professor of Natural Philosophy for nineteen years from 1835 at the University of Virginia. While Rogers was Chair of the Department of Philosophy at UVA, he vigorously defended the University's refusal to award honoris causa degrees to the Virginia State Legislature. He went on to found and serve as president of MIT from 1861 to 1870.

Though Rogers stood down from this position because of declining health, by necessity he returned to office in 1878 and continued to 1881. He died after collapsing during a speech at MIT's 1882 commencement exercises. His last words were "bituminous coal".[2]

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Rogers, William B., Chairman, The Committee of Associated Institutions of Science and Arts, "Objects and Plan of an Institute of Technology: including a Society of Arts, a Museum of Arts, and a School of Industrial Science; proposed to be established in Boston" - Boston, 1861, and archived at the MIT Libraries Collection.
  2. ^ Phillips, Henry Ayling (1915). George Ward Blodgett, Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering. Cambridge: Riverside Press, 27-30. 

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[edit] References

v • d • e
Presidents of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

William Rogers (1862) · John Daniel Runkle (1870) · William Rogers (1879) · Francis Walker (1881) · James Crafts (1897) · Henry Pritchett (1900) · Arthur Amos Noyes (1907) · Richard Maclaurin (1909) · Elihu Thomson (1920) · Ernest Nichols (1921) · Elihu Thomson (1922) · Samuel Stratton (1923) · Karl Compton (1930) · James Killian (1948) · Julius Stratton (1959) · Howard Johnson (1966) · Jerome Wiesner (1971) · Paul Gray (1980) · Charles Vest (1990) · Susan Hockfield (2004)
v • d • e
Presidents of the National Academy of Sciences

Alexander Bache (1863) · Joseph Henry (1868) · William Rogers (1879) · Othniel Marsh (1883) · Wolcott Gibbs (1895) · Alexander Agassiz (1901) · Ira Remsen (1907) · William H. Welch (1913) · Charles Walcott (1917) · Albert Michelson (1923) · Thomas Morgan (1927) · William Campbell (1931) · Frank Lillie (1935) · Frank B. Jewett (1939) · Alfred Richards (1947) · Detlev Bronk (1950) · Frederick Seitz (1962) · Philip Handler (1969) · Frank Press (1981) · Bruce Alberts (1993) · Ralph J. Cicerone (2005)
Persondata
NAME Rogers, William Barton
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION American scientist, founder of MIT
DATE OF BIRTH 7 December 1804
PLACE OF BIRTH Virginia
DATE OF DEATH 30 May 1882
PLACE OF DEATH Boston, Massachusetts
Languages