A Brief History Of The Chemistry Department

1926-1932 -- The Birth of the University; The Chemistry Department; Growing Pains of the Early Years 1932-1945 -- The Department Survives and Expands; The Prewar and Wartime Department Current segment: 1945-1949 -- The Postwar Explosion 1949-1959 -- The First Peak and Beyond; Stability and Anticipation 1959-1968 -- A New Program and a New President; A New Home and a New Chair To return to the Chemistry Department home page, please click the atom:

1945-1949

The Postwar Explosion

Hjort also left the department (in effect) in 1945 when he became Dean of the College of Liberal Arts. Technically, Hjort still remained a member of the chemistry faculty, but an inactive member with few if any departmental duties. As a fully functioning member of the department, Hjort was replaced by Warren H. Steinbach.

Born 1904 in Genoa, Nebraska, Steinbach earned his Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska in 1931. Having taught in public schools in Nebraska and at the Nebraska State Teachers College and the University of Arkansas, Steinbach came to the University of Miami in 1945 directly from his position as Assistant Director of Research at Varcum Chemical Corporation, Niagara Falls. He arrived as Associate Professor of Chemistry and Chairman of the Chemistry Department, advancing to full professor the following year. Warren Steinbach was to remain chairman for a little over 22 years, from his arrival in 1945 until January, 1968. He retired in 1969.

With the arrival of Steinbach and with war veterans flooding into the university at the end of World War II, financed by the GI Bill, the department grew explosively. Enrollment statistics -- a composite of a set reported by Schultz in the third UM CHEM and one published in an undated departmental document of 1956 or 1957 titled "Facts, Figures, and Doctoral Training Planning" -- summarize the growth of enrollments during the university's first 21 years, with emphasis on the postwar period:

And in a chapter titled The War Years, Tebeau sums up both the power behind the explosion and the influence of the returning veterans on college life:

Finally, a statement from an August, 1946, university publication, Supplementary Information for the Academic Year 1946-47, reflects the prevalent sense of change and growth:

The April 15, 1946 Bulletin describes a department still consisting of two faculty (in addition to Hjort): Cook and Steinbach. One year later the department had grown to a total of seven. As before, the seven did not include Hjort, but now for a different reason: Hjort had died from his cerebral accident.

In his first few years Steinbach hired five additional faculty:

Joseph E. Glackin, Assistant Professor of Chemistry, A.M. 1940, George Washington University

Horace B. Huddle, Professor of Chemistry, Ph.D. 1930, University of Chicago

Jackson P. Sickels, Assistant Professor of Chemistry, Ph.D. 1939, Yale University

Carl P. Tebeau, Associate Professor of Chemistry, Ph.D. 1941, University of North Carolina

Fred Vihlen, Assistant Instructor, A.B. 1943, Oglethorpe University

Huddle arrived in January, 1947. He taught inorganic chemistry and carried out research on the components of the oil of cedar wood. After 10 years in the department he took a year's leave of absence to head the chemistry department of Appalachian State Teachers College. He retired formally in July, 1958 to make permanent his new position. (Five months after retiring, Horace Huddle died of a heart attack during a visit to Miami over the Christmas holidays.)

Jackson P. Sickels

Sickels, a native of Wisconsin, came to the department in December, 1946, from a position with the American Cyanamid Corporation. In 1948 he advanced from Assistant to Associate Professor, and in 1952 to full Professor. Jackson Sickels retired in 1978 after 32 years in the department, a longer tenure than anyone else at the time. During these years his teaching and research interests centered on organic and biochemistry.

Tebeau, an analytical chemist originally from Guyton, Georgia, joined the department during the 1946-47 academic year as an Associate Professor, advancing to Professor a year later. He retired in 1974 after a total of 27 years. Carl P. Tebeau was the brother of Charlton W. Tebeau, Professor of History at the University of Miami and author of the history book cited as the first of the three references for this history.

Chemistry Faculty, 1946-1947 Front: Steinbach, Glackin, Tebeau, Huddle Rear: Cook, Sickels

This was also a time of expansion in the chemistry curriculum. In the April 15, 1946 announcement for the coming 1946-47 academic year, a baseline for the era, the department offered a total of 17 courses, ranging in code from 101 to 410. (The Chem 95,96 sequence had been dropped.) The highest degree offered was the B.S. with a major in chemistry.

In the next publication, the February 1, 1947 Announcement of Courses in the Graduate School for the Year 1947, the department offered an M.S. degree in chemistry, and added graduate, 500-level courses in organic, inorganic and electrochemistry as well as a set of five courses, Chem 591-595, titled Chemical Research. The established 400-level courses were also available for graduate credit.

Two months later, April 15, 1947, the general announcement Bulletin for the 1947-48 academic year describes both the new M.S. degree and two B.S. majors: 1) "B.S Degree with Major in Chemistry," and 2) "B.S. Degree with Professional Chemistry Major in Chemistry." By the following year the M.S. degree program had been refined to provide graduate majors in analytical, inorganic, organic, and physical chemistry.

The curriculum expanded as well, from the 17 courses of the 1946-47 year to a total of 31 courses for 1947-48, ranging from Chem 101 to 695, including six at the 500-level and 13 at the 600-level. The seven chemistry faculty appearing in the 1947-48 Bulletin were Professors Cook, Huddle, Steinbach, and Tebeau; Associate Professor Sickels; Assistant Professor Glackin; and Research Assistant Mustard. Fred Vihlen, who had joined the Department in 1946 as an Assistant Instructor and appeared in the 1947-48 Bulletin, was gone by now.

As for Margaret Jean Mustard, the new Research Assistant, this was her only appearance in the chemistry section of the Bulletin. A 1942 graduate of the university with a major in chemistry, she had done graduate work at both the University of Miami and the Ohio State University with the goal of working in horticulture at the University of Miami. With the university's expected expansion into horticulture aborted, Mustard joined the chemistry department briefly, then moved to the botany department. This ultimately joined with zoology to create the biology department, where Margaret Mustard spent the rest of her professional career. In the second departmental newsletter Schultz credits her as the source of his description of the Anastasia corridor in the late '30's and early '40's.

In addition to expanding the faculty, curriculum, degrees, and major options, Steinbach also created formal office support. Until his arrival the faculty handled the office duties as needed, with no designated staff. Steinbach changed this by bringing Ione Blackburn into the department in October, 1946, to teach freshman chemistry and to assume responsibility for the departmental office. A native of Miami, she had received both B.S. (1944) and M.A. (1946) degrees from Duke University.

Laura Hoagland

The 1948-49 Bulletin lists her as an Assistant Instructor appointed in 1947. In the third UM CHEM Schultz quotes Blackburn's description of the postwar office as a place of "pandemonium and millions of papers." In 1949 Laura Hoagland joined the department as Blackburn's office assistant and a year later replaced her. By the time she retired in 1976, Hoagland had supervised the chemistry office for 26 of her 27 years with the department.

One more event rounds out the postwar turmoil: the beginning of the move to Main Campus. In March, 1945, the Board of Trustees began work on the development of the Main Campus. With increases in available funds, in the size of the site, and in enrollments, construction resumed after a lag of two decades. The first of the permanent buildings on Main Campus, the north wing of the Memorial Classroom Building, was completed in November, 1946; the south wing followed a few months later. In September, 1947, freshman chemistry lectures transferred from the Anastasia to the Memorial Classroom Building; their associated laboratories went into nearby, temporary wooden buildings. All In other chemistry classes remained at North Campus.

Harry P. Schultz

Near midcentury the rapid expansion of the young department -- virtually an academic explosion -- reached its climax. Although the 1948-49 Bulletin appears to reflect strong continuation of growth, the data masks a slowing. The Bulletin lists seven new members of the department (all of whom arrived in 1947): Assistant Professors R. B. Ellis, James Moffat, and Harry P. Schultz; Instructor Fred W. Davis; and Assistant Instructors Ione C. Blackburn, Shyla Wollman, and Seymore Yolles. With both Glackin and Mustard of the preceding Bulletin now gone, the department had nonetheless grown remarkably, from seven to 12 members in a single year.

But this 70% increase is deceiving. Of the seven new faculty only Harry Schultz (a future Chair of the Chemistry Department and the author of the first seven UM CHEM newsletters) would become part of the department's future. Two years after arriving, Davis transferred to the university's Marine Laboratory, Ellis moved to the Southern Research Institute, and Moffat left as well; Yolles soon went to North Carolina for graduate studies.

As for coursework, several years would pass before significant changes occurred in either undergraduate or graduate programs. The expansion was beginning to fade into the slower growth of maturity.

In the third UM CHEM Schultz summarizes the staff of this postwar department: four professors, one associate professor, three assistant professors, one instructor, three assistant instructors, four graduate assistants, one stockroom employee, "and several student helpers."

In photographs of the time we see some of the faculty, students, and laboratory conditions of the department.

Chemistry Faculty, 1948-1949 Standing, left to right: Moffat, Sickels, Schultz, Huddle, Ellis, Davis, Tebeau Seated: Cook, Steinbach

Students in a research laboratory, 2nd floor, Anastasia Building, late 1940's.

Notice that standard laboratory practice at the time did not include wearing eye protection.

1926-1932 -- The Birth of the University; The Chemistry Department; Growing Pains of the Early Years 1932-1945 -- The Department Survives and Expands; The Prewar and Wartime Department Current segment: 1945-1949 -- The Postwar Explosion 1949-1959 -- The First Peak and Beyond; Stability and Anticipation 1959-1968 -- A New Program and a New President; A New Home and a New Chair To return to the Chemistry Department home page, please click the atom: