John Davidson Letcher (died 1938) was an American academic and an acting president of
Oregon State University. He served as the acting president for 4 months in 1892, upon the death of the second president
Benjamin Lee Arnold
Benjamin Lee Arnold (died January 30, 1892) was an American academic and the second president of Oregon State University.
Benjamin Lee Arnold grew up in Mecklenburg County, Virginia. He received his B.S. from Randolph Macon College and taught in ...
.
As a son of Virginia's Confederate governor
John Letcher, John Davidson Letcher was born in
Virginia and attended
Virginia Military Institute, where he obtained a degree in
civil engineering. With jobs in the field, he also taught mathematics in several colleges. It was in 1888 that he became a professor at Oregon State University (then "State Agricultural College of the State of Oregon") in
Corvallis, Oregon
Corvallis ( ) is a city and the county seat of Benton County in central western Oregon, United States. It is the principal city of the Corvallis, Oregon Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Benton County. As of the 2020 United ...
, as the Professor both of Mathematics and Engineering and of Military Science and Tactics.
After OSU's third president Benjamin Lee Arnold suddenly died in January 1892, Letcher was elected unanimously by the Board of Regents as the acting president of the college. His presidency lasted until early June of the year, when
John M. Bloss
John McKnight Bloss (January 21, 1839 – April 26, 1905) was an American Civil War soldier who had an influence on the Battle of Antietam and was later President of Oregon Agricultural College (now Oregon State University) from 1892 until 1896.
...
became the third permanent president of OSU. Letcher left the school in 1894 and then served as a mathematics professor of the
University of Oregon in
Eugene, Oregon
Eugene ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Oregon. It is located at the southern end of the Willamette Valley, near the confluence of the McKenzie and Willamette rivers, about east of the Oregon Coast.
As of the 2020 United States Census, Eu ...
until 1896. He returned to Virginia in 1896.
References
*https://web.archive.org/web/20080722214922/http://osulibrary.oregonstate.edu/archives/exhibits/presidents/letcher.html
Presidents of Oregon State University
Virginia Military Institute alumni
1938 deaths
People from Virginia
University of Oregon faculty
Year of birth missing
19th-century births
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