Born in Portland, Oregon, in August of 1887, Samuel H. Graf entered the Oregon Agricultural College in 1903 to study engineering. He received five engineering degrees from the college - B.S., Electrical Engineering (1907); E.E., Electrical Engineering (1908); B.S., Mechanical Engineering (1908); M.E., Mechanical Engineering (1909); and M.S., Electrical Engineering (1909). Between 1909 and 1954 Graf held several faculty positions in engineering at Oregon State. From 1909-1912 he was an instructor in mechanical engineering; from 1912-1920 he was the head of experimental engineering; head of the Department of Mechanics and Materials (1920-1934) and of the Department of Mechanical Engineering (1934-1954); director of engineering research (1928-1944); and director of the Engineering Experiment Station (1944-1954).
Richard Jeffrey Nichols was the librarian at Oregon Agricultural College from 1902 to 1908. A native Oregonian, Nichols was the first librarian not educated at OAC, earning his degree from Willamette University.
George Coote (1842-1908), a native of England, emigrated directly to Corvallis in 1877, where he established himself as a farmer. In 1888 Coote accepted a position within Oregon Agricultural College's Department of Horticulture - eventually becoming its chair - which he maintained until months before his death in November 1908. During his tenure, Coote was responsible for the college's grounds and greenhouses, and also published several Extension Service Bulletin articles on fruits, flowers, vegetables and nuts.
Greer succeeded Margaret Snell as head of the Department of Domestic Science and Art in 1908, and was named the first dean as a result of President Kerr’s academic reorganization of the college. She served until spring 1911. Greer was a graduate of Vassar College and spent ten years as an instructor at New York’s Pratt Institute prior to coming to OAC.
John Withycombe was a 1901 graduate of OAC and became a wheat rancher in eastern Oregon. James Withycombe, Experiment Station Director from 1908-1914 and Governor of Oregon from 1915-1919, was his uncle.
Faculty group photo with President Gatch taken around 1904-1905. Front row: Helen V. Crawford, Ida B. Callahan, Thomas H. Crawford, Dennis Patrick Quinlan, Thomas Milton Gatch, Nicholas Tartar, George Coote, Emile F. Pernot, Margaret Constock Snell, ?. Middle row: Helen Louise Holgate, Ernest Chesney Hayward, Gordon Vernon Skelton, James Withycombe, Herald Taillandier, Arthur Burton Cordley, Abraham Lincoln Kinsley, Charles Leslie Johnson, Will Orian Trine, Richard Jeffery Nichols, ?, Frank E. Edwards. Back row: Thomas Bilyeu, Grant Adelbert Covell, Frederick Berchtold, Clarence Melville McKellips, Mark Clyde Phillips, Edward Ralph Lake, John Baptiste Horner, John Franklin Fulton.
Thomas M. Gatch was the fifth president of Oregon Agricultural College from 1897-1907. Gatch established a number of four year programs including electrical engineering, horticulture, and forestry. OAC experienced an increase in student enrollment during Gatch's years as president. Photo was used in the 1908 Orange, page 3.