Fifty years have passed since the death of AUB President Stephen Penrose, who, like Howard Bliss and Malcolm Kerr, died while in office. Stephen Penrose died of a heart attack at the age of 46 on December 9, 1954. He had come to Beirut from Walla Walla, Washington, after having completed his undergraduate studies in physics at Whitman College. When he came to AUB he taught physics from 1928 until 1931. He later returned to the United States to earn a PhD in philosophy at Columbia University. In 1948, Professor Penrose came back to AUB, not as a professor but as the fifth president of AUB. He was known for his dedication to the University. Not only did he work hard on gathering funds for the University, but he also played a vital role in establishing the School of Public Health, which, now the Faculty of Health Sciences, is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year. Penrose wrote what President John Waterbury describes as “the single best history of AUB, entitled That They May Have Life,” published in Beirut in 1941. Since 1955, one graduating student from each of the faculties at AUB, distinguished for his or her "scholarship, character, leadership, and contribution to university life,” has received the Penrose Award, named after the late president. On December 9, 2004, exactly fifty years after the death of Stephen Penrose, AUB President John Waterbury, his wife Sarah, Dean of the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences Nuhad Daghir, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Khalil Bitar, Professor Samir Khalaf, Director of Information and Public Relations Ibrahim Khoury, and Captain Saadallah Shalak visited Stephen Penrose’s grave in the British-American Cemetery in Sin el Fil. President Waterbury, who placed a bouquet of flowers on the grave of Stephen Penrose, said that “all of AUB, Beirut and Lebanon were shocked and saddened by his sudden passing away in 1954. His death came a mere six days after Founders’ Day. He is survived today by his three children, Dale, Polly, and Steve. Stephen Penrose lay the foundations for AUB’s great period of growth and excellence in the 1950s and 1960s. We should look back on his tenure with gratitude and deep respect.”
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