FOUNDATIONS
Family Ties
The Lampe family has played a big part in the College's success for 65 years.
Lampe establishes professorship in biomedical engineering
Part of the Lampe family legacy at NC State is its long history of support for the College and its programs. Now, a family member is stepping forward again.
Dr. Ross W. Lampe Jr. has established a professorship in the Joint NC State-UNC Department of Biomedical Engineering. The professorship will eventually be funded at $1 million by Lampe and matching funds from sources that include the state’s Distinguished Professorship Endowment Trust Fund.
The endowed professorship will be the first established in the department, which was formed in 2003 and is co-located at the College of Engineering at NC State and the School of Medicine at UNC-Chapel Hill.
“Biomedical engineering is a growing field at NC State and in North Carolina,” Lampe said. “These professorships help with recruiting and supporting top faculty members who can bring in lots of research dollars that fund graduate assistantships and help raise the stature of the entire department.”
Lampe is president and chief executive officer of SMD Software, a leading self-storage software company based in Raleigh. He received his bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering from NC State in 1977 and his PhD in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
When Dr. Ross Lampe Jr. was a little boy he would occasionally go to his grandfather’s office in Riddick Hall. The dean of engineering at the time, Dr. J. Harold Lampe, liked having his grandson around while he caught up on work on Sunday afternoons.
Later, when the younger Lampe attended NC State, he would walk into Riddick and see the portrait of his grandfather hanging on the wall.
“I felt like he was always looking at me,” Ross Lampe Jr. said, smiling. “And so I had better perform well in school.”
Ross Lampe Jr. is among 15 members of the Lampe family who have attended NC State over the past 65 years, building on a tradition that J. Harold Lampe set when he moved his family from Connecticut and took over as dean of engineering in 1945. The family has produced graduates who have excelled in their fields and have given back to NC State, particularly the College of Engineering.
Two of the first family members to attend NC State were the dean’s sons, Ross Lampe Sr. and John G. Lampe. With the family living just a few blocks away from their father’s office, their college options were limited.
“It’s embarrassing, but my father told us we were going to NC State,” Ross Lampe Sr. said, laughing. “We had no choice.”
As dean, J. Harold Lampe served for 17 years, the longest of any dean of engineering at NC State. The College’s many advancements during his tenure include developing curricula in furniture manufacturing and other fields that served the state’s specialized industrial needs. NC State also built the country’s first nuclear reactor on a university campus during that time, as well as three new engineering buildings. Dean Lampe was also a pivotal figure in the planning of Research Triangle Park.
After Dean Lampe stepped down in 1962, the family remained close to the College. Ross Lampe Sr., a 1951 graduate in chemical engineering who has been president of the Guy C. Lee Manufacturing Company in Smithfield, NC, since 1959, was named a Distinguished Engineering Alumnus by the College in 2002. He was a driving force behind the establishment in 1993 of the family’s J.H. Lampe Engineering Excellence Fund, an unrestricted endowment to the College made in memory of Dean Lampe.
Ross Lampe Jr., a 1977 industrial engineering alumnus, serves on the NC State Engineering Foundation Board of Directors. In 2005, he and the rest of the family established the Lampe Professorship in Electrical Engineering, a position that was eventually filled by Dr. Michael Steer. The researcher has since received international acclaim for his work on the interactions between electromagnetic fields and electronic devices that has helped American forces remotely counter roadside bombs. His efforts have saved hundreds of soldiers’ lives in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Now, another Lampe professorship is being established in biomedical engineering.
“NC State means excellence,” Ross Lampe Sr. said. “This university has raised the bar in many areas and aspects of life in North Carolina.”
Meanwhile, there are currently five family members enrolled at NC State, and many more are likely on the way. John H. Lampe II, a 1983 history graduate, looks at his two youngest children, both elementary schoolers, and jokes that their college decision has already been made.
NC State, of course.
“We’ve already filled out applications for them,” he said,
laughing. “We’re keeping them on file ready to go.” 