Clara A. Storvick

Title: Clara A. Storvick
LC Subject: Universities and colleges--Faculty Portraits Foods and Nutrition Storvick, Clara A.
Creator: Hise Studio
Description: Clara A Storvick was a Professor in Foods & Nutrition and Chairman of Home Economics Research in the Experiment Station, from 1945 to 1972. She was born in 1906 in Emmons, Minnesota. She earned her Bachelor of Arts from St. Olaf College in 1929 in physiology and biology, her Master of Science from Iowa State University in 1933, and her PhD. from Cornell in 1941 in nutrition, physiology, and biochemistry. Her thesis for her master’s degree was titled “Effect of the ingestion of coffee on the calcium metabolism of the albino rat.” For her doctoral dissertation, her thesis was titled “Ascorbic acid metabolism studies in human beings.” In 1945, she came to OSC as she wanted to devote more of her time to research. She was said to be an inspiring and challenging teacher. In her research work, she was considered “imaginative, thorough, careful and scholarly.” She was interested in “fundamental investigations on man and his nutritive requirements.” She worked with ascorbic acid, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, and vitamin B6 metabolism. She was considered a national leader in research on Vitamin B in the blood. In cooperative research she made “outstanding contributions.” Five states in the West, including Oregon, had previously done cooperative research on an informal basis with no budget, but she was the first to administer the regional funds available in the Research and Marketing Act. She led a group of twenty-two workers in the field and laboratory, and set an example for all the other Western states in studying nutritional status and dental care. She was a member of the American Institute of Nutrition, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Home Economics Association, among others. She held offices in the OSU chapter of Sigma Xi as secretary, vice president, and president. She was also Chairman of the Sabbatical Leave Committee of the American Association of University Professors. She received the Borden Award from the American Home Economics Association in 1952, the Distinguished alumni award from St. Olaf College in 1954, and the Sigma Xi lectureship from Oregon State University in 1953. She could write and speak Norwegian, and examined graduate students in Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish. She was named Associate Professor in 1945, and full Professor in 1948. In 1948, Storvick was offered a professorship at Cornell. In response, OSC raised her salary to $5565 per year. She took sabbatical leave in 1952 on half salary to study blood thiamine at Columbia University and nutrients in blood at the University of Copenhagen. She took another sabbatical leave for a few months in 1959, to participate in research on “enzymes, coenzymes, and vitamins” at the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Her next sabbatical leave was for January-August in 1966, which she used to do research at the Cancer Research Hospital at the University of Wisconsin. In 1972, she became Director of the Nutrition Research Institute and Chairman of Home Economics Research. She was author or co-author of 71 publications on mineral, vitamin, and amino acid metabolism and relationship of nutrition to dental health. She was awarded emeritus status upon her retirement in 1972. She was employed on a part-time emergency basis the following summer.
Work Type: photographic prints photographs black-and-white photographs
Date: 1945/1959 circa
Identifier: P092:0613
Rights: In Copyright
Local Collection Name: President's Office Photographs, 1923-1998 (P 092)
Type: Image
Format: image/tiff
Set: OSU Special Collections & Archives Research Center Historical Images of Oregon State University
Primary Set: OSU Special Collections & Archives Research Center
Institution: Oregon State University