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Wall of Fame


Ray D. Owen

Class Of: 1933
Inducted In: 2009



Ray D. Owen, Class of 1933. During high school, Ray’s activities were limited due his work on the family farm. Ray was involved in editing the school yearbook that was called “The Mohawk”. Ray graduated from Carroll College in 1937 with major in Biology. He received his Ph.D. from The University of Wisconsin in 1941 in Genetics. Throughout Ray’s career he dedicated himself to seminal research contributions to immunology and genetics, especially tolerance and stem cells. Ray was involved in the early stages of bone marrow transplants. He has taught and mentored students at all levels. Ray has chaired the Biology Division and was the Dean and Vice President at Caltech. He has chaired many national committees. Ray has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. Ray has been working at California Institute of Technology since 1947. If he were to single out one particular activity he remembers with pride, it would be his Chairmanship of an ad-hoc faculty committee on the freshman year at Caltech. This committee was able to inaugurate the pass/fail grading system to make it less traumatic for its freshman; the introduction of electives into the freshman curriculum; and, especially, the admission of women to the Caltech’s freshman class. Mr. Owen currently resides in Pasadena, CA. He says that many aspects of his life have given him pleasure—his family, his home, his garden, his travels, his friends, and his students.


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