Roll Call Tribute

The Association was notified of this Aggie's passing on 05/12/1972.
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Chancellor emeritus of Texas A&M. Did not attend Texas A&M. Made an honorary member of Class of 1913.
Received a B.S. in civil engineering from the University of Texas in 1909.

Photo from findagrave.com.
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From findagrave.com

Gibb Gilchrist

BIRTH 23 Dec 1887
Wills Point, Van Zandt County, Texas, USA
DEATH 12 May 1972 (aged 84)
Bryan, Brazos County, Texas, USA
BURIAL
College Station Cemetery
College Station, Brazos County, Texas, USA
MEMORIAL ID 71653103 · View Source

President and Chancellor of Texas A&M University.

From History of the Office of the President:

Gibb Gilchrist, C.E.
President May 27, 1944-September 1, 1948
Chancellor of the Texas A&M System September 1, 1948-August 31, 1953

Gibb Gilchrist was appointed dean of the School of Engineering in 1937 and elected president of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas on May 27, 1944. He served as the president of the College until September 1, 1948, when the Texas A&M System was created. At this time, Gilchrist became the first chancellor of the A&M System, serving until his retirement on August 31, 1953.

See Gibb's Masonic Grand Master biography at The Grand Lodge of Texas.

See Gibb's page in the Handbook of Texas.


Family Members

Parents
Photo
Angus Jackson Gilchrist
1833–1888

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Kate Douglass Gilchrist
1849–1924

Spouse
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Vesta Weaver Gilchrist
1888–1974 (m. 1920)

Siblings
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Henry Gilchrist
1866–1936

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Angus Gilchrist McKain
1883–1963

Children
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Henry Gilchrist
1924–2017


Inscription

Grand Master of Masons in Texas
12-6-1951 to 12-4-1952
Seal of Texas


Created by: JCF
Added: 20 Jun 2011
Find A Grave Memorial 71653103
Source citation
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https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fgi14

GILCHRIST, GIBB

Christina Irene van Doorninck

GILCHRIST, GIBB (1887–1972). Gibb Gilchrist, engineer and university president, was born in Wills Point, Texas, on December 23, 1887. He attended Southwestern University in Georgetown in 1905–06 and received a B.S. in civil engineering from the University of Texas in 1909. From 1910 to 1917 the Santa Fe Railroad employed him as a construction engineer. In World War I he served first as a lieutenant and then as captain of engineers. He became a division engineer with the state highway department in San Antonio and San Angelo at the end of the war and was named state highway engineer in 1924. He married Vesta Weaver in March 1920; they had one son. From 1925 until 1927 Gilchrist was a consulting engineer to private business.

In 1927 he was again appointed state highway engineer, and during the next ten years he administered a program of highway development that expended more than $3 million, including the implementation of the state's farm-to-market road system (see HIGHWAY DEVELOPMENT). Gilchrist was president of the American Association of State Highway Officials in 1936, when Secretary of State Cordell Hull appointed him to the permanent International Association of Roads Congress as a representative of the United States.

In 1937 Gilchrist accepted a job as dean of the School of Engineering at the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas (now Texas A&M University). He established a Department of Aeronautical Engineering during his first year at A&M. His idea for a flight-training program, together with the development of suitable facilities, resulted in Easterwood Airport. As a member of the directing board, he served the United States Office of Education in engineering, science, and management war-training courses. Austin College awarded him an honorary doctor of science degree in 1939. He also held honorary degrees from Baylor University and Southwestern University. In 1945 he was named chairman of the Texas Post War Economic Planning Commission.

On May 25, 1944, the Texas A&M Board of Directors named Gilchrist to the presidency, and he promptly set about the task of reorganizing the school by integrating its research and extension services into the academic branches. His objectives were twofold: to focus A&M's engineering and agricultural research and instruction on the development of Texas resources and to establish community technical-training centers throughout Texas. He formed new departments and reorganized the engineering department. One of his administration's most important accomplishments was the establishment, on November 14, 1944, of the Texas A&M Research Foundation, a nonprofit state organization that allowed grants to be made to the university for research that would otherwise have been beyond its legal authority to conduct. Gilchrist's foresight allowed for expansion in a multitude of new research areas including oceanography, nuclear power, and aerospace. During his presidency Texas A&M emerged as an engineering school of national reputation.

In his effort toward modernization, Gilchrist ran up against opposition. Most forms of hazing had been banned by state law, and he reorganized student administration and discipline. A student protest resulted in a legislative investigation of the administration during the spring of 1947. Gilchrist's name was cleared, and the entire event was attributed to students who had disagreed with his policies on hazing and had set out to discredit him, aided by faculty disgruntled over his administrative reforms. The board of directors responded in May 1948 by establishing the Texas A&M College System (now the Texas A&M University Systemqv) and naming Gilchrist as its first chancellor, effective on September 1, 1948. He served until August 31, 1953. In 1951 he was installed as grand master of Texas Masons, and in 1959 the University of Texas College of Engineering named him a distinguished engineering graduate. The American Society of Civil Engineers named him an honorary member in 1965.

Gilchrist spent his retirement in College Station. He died there on May 12, 1972, and was buried there.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Dallas Morning News, May 26, 1944. Henry C. Dethloff, A Centennial History of Texas A&M University, 1876–1976 (2 vols., College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1975). Houston Post, May 26, 1944, April 1, 1947.

Uploaded on June 15, 2010. Published by the Texas State Historical Association.