University of Virginia Library

JOHN W. MALLET PROFESSORSHIP OF CHEMISTRY

The President announced the receipt of a gift by an anonymous donor for the support of
instruction and research in the Department of Chemistry. This gift consists of 2,300 shares of
common stock of the Du Pont Company. The anonymous donor, who has previously made gifts of
approximately the same amounts for the Departments of Physics and Biology, has directed that the
gift is to be used to supplement the salary of a distinguished professor to occupy a Chair to be
known as the John W. Mallet Professorship of Chemistry, to supplement the salaries of younger,
promising members of the faculty of the Department of Chemistry, to purchase equipment needed in
Chemistry, and to establish a scholarship fund to be used to attract undergraduate, graduate, and
post doctoral students. The gift was made on the condition that an appropriation be made by the
1962 General Assembly in the amount of $3.5 million to construct a Chemistry Building. As the
President reported to the Board at its April meeting (Minute Book, University of Virginia, No. 12,
14 April 1962, p. 314), such an appropriation was made, and it is now necessary to establish the
Chair in Chemistry as requested by the anonymous donor

Mr. John W. Mallet was born near Dublin, Ireland on 10 October 1832. He came to the United
States in 1853 to collect information for his father about the Erickson Caloric Engine with no
expectation of remaining in this country. He became a professor at Amherst College, however, and
served as a member of the faculty at a number of institutions of higher learning in this country
before accepting a position as Professor of Chemistry at the University of Virginia. He was a
member of the University faculty from 1868 to 1883 and from 1885 to 1908 when he retired and
became Professor Emeritus. He died in 1912

The President proposed and the Board adopted the following resolution

RESOLVED by the Board of Visitors of The Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia
that there is hereby established a Chair in the Department of Chemistry to be known as the John W.
Mallet Professorship of Chemistry.