Sometimes, I think of a university as a kind of geologic formation: Every year, new students, faculty, staff, and administrators join the enterprise, adding their aspirations, talents, and accomplishments. Over the years, these sedimentary layers build up, moving, changing, and creating a distinctive and ever-stronger institution. At Rensselaer, this has been going on for more than 180 years.
Every once in a while, someone comes along who really adds to the layers and shifts the tectonic plates. On March 17 this year, we lost such a mover and shaker when Stephen E. Wiberley, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry, died at Samaritan Hospital.
At 87 years of age, and recently in poor health, Wiberley slipped away quietly. But—and thankfully for RPI—little else about this man was quiet. He worked on the Manhattan Project during World War II, earned his Ph.D. at Rensselaer in 1950, and was invited to join the chemistry faculty, retiring in 1989. He taught and inspired countless students. He was a respected researcher, active in faculty affairs, and a true citizen of his campus and community.
In the 1960s, Wiberley led the interdisciplinary program in materials research that inspired the National Science Foundation and NASA to build the Materials Research Center. As dean of the graduate school and later as vice provost, he was a key figure in the fight, and I understand it was a fight, to build the Folsom Library. He served as acting provost, acting librarian, and at one point oversaw athletics. He helped RPI through student demonstrations in the 1960s. He was instrumental in building the Hartford Graduate Center facility (now Rensselaer at Hartford). With Father Tom Phelan, he led the effort to build the Chapel + Cultural Center.
He received the Rensselaer Alumni Association Outstanding Faculty Award, the Rensselaer Newman Foundation Sun and Balance Award, and was elected to the Athletics Hall of Fame.
Wiberley represented the qualities we respect and admire in university faculty. He stood for the students, he stood for the faculty, and he stood for what he believed to be right for the Institute. He not only stood, but he delivered. Blessed with an outrageous sense of humor and a raucous laugh, he could make his points and carry the day without rancor. Even after retirement, he generously gave his time and talent to RPI, to the Friends of the Folsom Library, and to the Rensselaer Newman Foundation.
A man with enormous respect for academia, Wiberley nonetheless remained irreverent to the end. He entitled his memoirs, published in 2004, No Ivory Tower.
No ivory tower, indeed. Universities are their people. We all contribute to the layers and the plates. Some, like Wiberley, lead the way. We are so much richer, and today just a little bit poorer, for this man and his work.
