Gavett Hall in 1930

The Engineering Building was opened in October, 1930, south of the main Eastman Quadrangle buildings.  It was renamed as Gavett Hall in 1949 after the first Pfoessor of Mechanical Engineering, Joseph William Gavett, Jr.   He was born in Plainfield, New Jersey on April 20, 1889. He was a graduate of Cornell University, and received his masters degree in engineering from there in 1911. From 1916 until 1921 he was an instructor and assistant professor at Cornell; he served as a captain in the United States Army between 1917 and 1919. He was engaged in making a photographic report on engineering work on the Western Front, which was published in France in 1919. In 1921 he came to the University of Rochester as a professor of mechanical engineering and chairman of that department. In 1927 he was made Yates Professor of Mechanical Engineering.  Professor Gavett died on August 28, 1942.

A two-story annex was built on the south side in 1947 to house the new (and ill-fated) electrical engineer program, and a third floor was added to the annex in 1960.  The building was remodeled in 1963 after Hopeman Hall opened.

The new Laboratory for Laser Energetics installed a four-beam Delta laser in the building in 1971. 

References
1942 "Prof. Gavett, U. of R., Dies," Democrat and Chronicle, August 19, 1942, Page 8.

1942 Cornell Alumni News 45(3):38 (October 8, 1942)
'11 Joseph William Gavett, Jr., August 18, 1942, in Rochester. He entered Sibley College from Plainfield, N.J., High  School.  Instructor in Engineering in 1916-17, he was a captain in the US Army Engineer Corps in France from 1917-19 and returned as assistant professor of Engineering until  1921 when he was appointed professor and chairman of the department of engineering at University of Rochester.

1949 "'Gavett Hall' Honors Memory of Professor Joseph W. Gavett, Jr.," Campus, October 14, 1949, Page 3. | Part 2 |

1949 Rochester Review 11(2):10 (December 1949-January 1950)
College Engineering Building named Gavett Hall
By action of the Board of Trustees, the engineering building at the Men's College has been named Gavett Hall, in memory of Prof. Joseph W. Gavett Jr., chairman of the Department of Engineering from 1921 until his death on August 28, 1942, at the age of 52.
One of the University's most revered teachers, Professor Gavett not only was an able educator and administrator, but possessed a great understanding of students.
"He was beloved by every student who ever attended his classes," says Dr. J. Edward Hoffmeister, Dean of the College of Arts and Science, "and he enjoyed friendship and respect throughout the community. He is remembered as one who helped to mould the character of many young men, and who helped them in solving their personal problems."
Under Professor Gavett's leadership, the Engineering Department expanded from a small one to become a major division of the College of Arts and Science, establishing the high standards which made its program widely known in the mechanical and chemical engineering fields.
Gavett Hall houses the departments of mechanical and chemical engineering. The department was reorganized as the Division of Engineering in 1945. A new wing was added to the building in 1947 providing considerable additional space for the greatly increased number of engineering students, and the most up-to-date laboratory equipment and facilities. Approximately 25 per cent of the students in the Men's College are engineering majors.
The University graduated its first engineers in 1914, when three received their diplomas. The department grew steadily, and during World War II, hundreds of Navy V-12 trainees and civilian students took various engineering courses under a greatly expanded wartime study program.
A graduate of Cornell University, where he received a master's degree in engineering in 1911, Professor Gavett was an instructor and assistant professor in engineering there, interrupting his teaching from 1917 to 1919 to make a photographic report on engineering work on the Western Front which was published in France in 1919. He was a captain in the U. S. Army in Wodd War I.  Professor Gavett came to Rochester in 1921 as professor of mechanical engineering and chairman of the department.

1951 "Homecoming Alumni Crowd UR Campus," Democrat and Chronicle, October 28, 1951, Page 2B.
Engineers among the visiting graduates paid tribute to a beloved professor, the late Joseph W. Gavett Jr., who for 21 years influenced the standards of the engineering department and built it up as a major division of the College of Arts and Science. Yesterday morning his former students dedicated the River Campus engineering building as Gavett Hall and presented a portrait of the professor to the university.

1963 "Engineers Receive Grant:  Physical Plant Progresses," Campus Times, May 10, 1963, Page 1. | Part 2 |
The Department of Electrical Engineering will move it offices and laboratories about June 1 to the new Hopeman Hall, and the remodeling of Gavett Hall will begin shortly thereafter.

1977 History of the University of Rochester, 1850-1962, by Arthur J. May.  Expanded edition with notes
Chapter 22, Oak Hill Becomes River Campus
South of the Quadrangle facilities for mechanical and chemical engineering were constructed and, like the laboratories in the science buildings, the engineering structure and an adjacent shop for instruction were by the standards of the late 1920's superbly equipped.
Chapter 23, The Changing College
The training of mechanical and chemical engineers advanced to higher levels after Joseph W. Gavett was placed at the head of the department (1921). To a fine personality and a logical mind, he united lofty educational principles, insisting, for instance, that engineering undergraduates should include liberal, culturally and intellectually broadening subjects in their programs. Both for himself and for embryonic engineers Gavett set exacting standards, and he gave a distinctive course on the principles of the engineering profession. He excelled in unraveling the mysteries of thermodynamics and heat engines. Beyond that, he knitted close technical bonds with leading Rochester industries, which were mutually profitable. Since Gavett bore the heaviest burden of planning the new engineering complex on the River Campus, it was peculiarly fitting that his name should have been placed on its major unit. From Cornell, Gavett brought with him Horace W. Leet who taught mechanical engineering at the U. of R. for thirty-nine years. His responsibilities covered machine drawing, structural design, and the kinematics of machines. After attaining emeritus status, Leet continued to teach the professional engineering course.
Chapter 32, Valentine: The Last Phase
An ambitious plan to expand the division of engineering by adding instruction in electrical engineering had a chequered career. Started in 1945, electrical engineering enrolled a large number of students, especially military veterans. J. Harrison Belknap, serving with the army in Germany, was chosen as professor of electrical engineering as well as chairman of the division of engineering and arrived in Rochester in the spring of 1946. It was soon evident--painfully so--that the costs of instruction and equipment in electrical engineering far outran advance calculations; the income from an endowment of around one million dollars, it was discovered, would be required. Unless interested Rochester industries were willing to underwrite the program, wisdom dictated that it should be discontinued; a good share of the deliberations on the subject were not put on paper, though it is clear that in some University circles it was felt, quite apart from the financial aspects, that a disproportionately high percentage of the men undergraduates enrolled in engineering.
Consequently, the University trustees voted to eliminate electrical engineering as of 1950, and, as for years past, to concentrate on training mechanical and chemical engineers. That decision, interpreted as a breach of faith, evoked a storm of resentment and unfavorable publicity, highly critical of the University in general and president Valentine particularly. To the protesting students Valentine seemed ''the typical army officer --issuing orders from the top--doing little to achieve the camaraderie and loyalty of his men;" they flatly doubted whether the financial angle was the basic cause for an arbitrary reversal of policy. Tempers cooled, however, when it was announced that arrangements would be made so that the students involved could complete their work at Rochester or be transferred, with administrative help, to other institutions. In high dudgeon, Belknap retired from the University stage.
Chapter 33, The First Century Ends
The ill-starred adventure in electrical engineering necessitated the construction of a two-story wing on the south end of what became Gavett Hall. Finished in October, 1947, it had faculty offices, computing and class rooms, a shop, and a large library. That year enrollment in all branches of engineering swept past the 400 mark, almost twice as large as before the war.
Chapter 37, In Pursuit of Excellence
Both Gavett and Harkness Halls had (1960, 1962) third floors and mezzanine levels installed, the Harkness expansion being principally for use as classrooms and faculty studies.

© 2021 Morris A. Pierce