It is with great sadness that we share with the University community that Clarkson Distinguished Professor Emeritus and Distinguished Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering William R. Wilcox, and husband to Distinguished Research Professor of Engineering Liya Regel, passed away December 17.
Wilcox came to Clarkson in 1975. He served as department chair, dean of engineering, and founding director of the New York State Center for Advanced Materials Processing (CAMP). He was director of the Consortium for the NASA Center for the Commercial Development of Crystal Growth at Clarkson and also served as the associate director for the International Center for Gravity Materials Science and Applications. In 2017 he was named a distinguished professor emeritus and honored for 42 years of exemplary service to the University.
Please see below for Bill’s obituary.
On behalf of the Clarkson Community, our sincerest condolences are extended to Bill’s wife, Liya, and all his family.
President Tony Collins
Obituary: William R. Wilcox, 85
William Wilcox died peacefully in Massachusetts on December 17.
Bill was born in Manhattan, Kansas on January 14, 1935. His childhood was spent in St. Louis, Washington DC, Ness City (Kansas), and Torrance (California). He received a B.E. degree from the University of Southern California in 1956 and a PhD from the University of California at Berkeley in 1960, both in Chemical Engineering. After working for TRW Semiconductors and the Aerospace Corporation for 8 years, Bill returned to USC as a professor of chemical engineering and materials science.
In 1975 Bill was recruited by Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York to head its chemical engineering department. Over the next 42 years he served Clarkson as its dean of engineering, the first head of the New York State Center for Advanced Materials Processing, and director of the NASA Center for the Commercial Development of Crystals in Space.
Two years prior to coming to Clarkson, Wilcox began a 30-year association with NASA’s microgravity materials research program. This included both ground-based research and experiments in Skylab, the Space Shuttle, and sounding rockets, as well as two sets of experiments performed by Wilcox himself on the notorious “vomit comet” low-gravity aircraft.
Bill is survived by his wife, brother, 4 children, 7 grandchildren, and 2 great grandchildren. He also has 31 academic children, i.e. former PhD students that he advised, as well as 30 MS students. Generations of undergraduate and graduate students benefited from his courses on subjects ranging from statistics to materials science. In 2003, Wilcox was named “Clarkson Distinguished Professor” in recognition of his high level of scholarly achievement and service to the University. He retired in 2017 and moved to Massachusetts.
His cremains will be buried in the Ness City, Kansas, where his father, mother and youngest brother.
Donations in his honor may be given to the Clarkson Fund, https://connect.clarkson.edu/register/giving.
The dates of memorial service and celebration of Bill’s extraordinary life to be determined by Covid-19 restrictions.