Nathaniel Thomas Lupton

Nathaniel Thomas Lupton
Born December 30, 1830
Winchester, Virginia
Died June 11, 1893
Auburn, Alabama
Resting place
 Pine Hill Cemetery
Education Newark Academy
Dickinson College
Occupation Chemist, university professor
Religion Methodist
Spouse(s) Ella Virginia Allemong
Children 3
Parent(s) Nathaniel Lupton
Elizabeth (Hodgson) Lupton

Nathaniel Thomas Lupton (1830–1893) was an American chemist and university professor. He served as the President of the University of Alabama from 1871 to 1874. Additionally, he served as State Chemist of Alabama.

Biography

Early life

Nathaniel Thomas Lupton was born on December 30, 1830 near Winchester, Virginia.[1][2][3][4] His father was Nathaniel Lupton and his mother, Elizabeth Hodgson.[2] He was raised as a Methodist, and would remain a devout Methodist all his life.[2] He was educated at the defunct Newark Academy in Delaware.[2] He attended Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania from 1846 to 1849, where he was a member of the Belles Lettres Society.[2][3] He graduated in 1849, planning to study the Law.[2][4]

Career

He started his career teaching Chemistry at Aberdeen Female College, a Methodist women's school in Aberdeen, Mississippi.[2][5] In 1852, he moved to Petersburg, Virginia, where he taught chemistry in another Methodist school.[2][5] From 1854 to 1856, he served as President of Petersburg College, even though he was only twenty-four years old.[2] In 1856, he became a Professor of Chemistry at Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, Virginia.[2][3] He went traveling in Europe and took lessons from renowned German chemist Robert Bunsen (1811–1899) at the Heidelberg University in Heidelberg, Germany.[2][4][5] Back in the US, he taught chemistry at Southern University in Greensboro, Alabama (now known as Birmingham–Southern College and located in Birmingham, Alabama).[2][5][6]

During the American Civil War of 1861–1865, he ran the Confederate Nitre and Mining Bureau in Selma, Alabama, which supplied powder and artillery ordnance to the Confederate States Army.[2][3][4][6] Politically, he was a Democrat.[2]

In 1869, he was hired by the Smithsonian Institution to explore the Moundville Archaeological Site in Moundville, Alabama.[7] He returned to academia to serve as the sixth President of the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama from 1871 to 1874.[2][3][4][5] He helped in its reconstruction, as the university had been heavily damaged by Northern troops, but struggled to find sufficient funding.[2][3] In 1874, he moved to Nashville, Tennessee, where he worked as a Professor of Chemistry at Vanderbilt University and later as Head of Pharmacy until 1885.[2][3][5][8] During that time, he also took trips to Europe to stock the chemistry laboratories at Vanderbilt. Finally, he moved to the new Alabama Polytechnic Institute (now known as Auburn University) in Auburn, Alabama, where he taught chemistry and started the Nathaniel T. Lupton Conversation Club "for social and intellectual improvement."[2][3][9] He also served as State Chemist of Alabama.[2][3]

During his summers, he explored the West and became involved in the mining industry in Mexico.[2] He was also interested in Native American culture.[2]

Personal life

He married Ella Virginia Allemong.[2][5] They had three children.[2] Their daughter Kate was the first female to graduate from Vanderbilt University.[2]

He died on June 11, 1893 in Auburn, Alabama.[1][2][3] He was buried in the Pine Hill Cemetery in Auburn.[1]

Bibliography

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 FindAGrave
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 2.8 2.9 2.10 2.11 2.12 2.13 2.14 2.15 2.16 2.17 2.18 2.19 2.20 2.21 2.22 2.23 2.24 Dickinson College: Nathaniel Thomas Lupton
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 3.8 3.9 6. Nathaniel T. Lupton 1871–1874, Tuscaloosa News, May 02, 2006
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 Dan R. Frost, Thinking Confederates: Academia and the Idea of Progress in the New South, Knoxville, Tennessee: University of Tennessee Press, 2000, p. 70
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 Mary Chapman Mathews, A Mansion's Memories, Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press, 2006, pp. 20-21
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Josiah Gorgas, The Journals of Josiah Gorgas, 1857–1878, Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press, 1995, p. 189
  7. ↑ Reid Badger (ed.), John Scudder, Jr. (ed.), Lawrence Clayton (ed.), Alabama and the Borderlands: From Prehistory To Statehood, Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press, 2003, p. 40
  8. ↑ Vanderbilt University Faculty in 1875
  9. ↑ Nathaniel T. Lupton Conversation Club
  10. ↑ Google Books
  11. ↑ Google Books
  12. ↑ Google Books
  13. ↑ Google Books
  14. ↑ Google Books
  15. ↑ Google Books