Cheadle, Mary Low

Biography / Administrative History

Vernon Irvin Cheadle was both an academician and administrator at several colleges and universities across the country, but he is best known for his role as Chancellor of UCSB from 1962 to 1977. Cheadle was born in Salem, South Dakota on February 6, 1910. As a high-school and college student, he competed in track and field events and was also a member of the basketball and football teams. He attended South Dakota State University for one year before transferring to Miami University where he received a B.S. (magna cum laude) in 1932. In 1932 he was accepted to Harvard University and he received an M.S. in 1934 and his Ph.D. in botany in 1936 under the mentorship of Ralph H. Wetmore. After graduating from Harvard, Vernon Cheadle spent six weeks on a collecting trip in Cuba. Many of the specimens he collected are still preserved in his vast plant specimen collection in the Cheadle Center for Biodiversity and Ecological Restoration at UCSB. While on his collecting trip, he was offered a position in the Department of Botany at Rhode Island State College, an appointment he began in 1936. He was Professor and Chair of the department from 1942 to 1952 and also served as Director of the Graduate Division. From 1944 to 1946 he served as a U.S. Navy lieutenant in the Pacific theater.

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