CAES Hall of Fame Inductee, Department Chair Samuel J. Dunn Passes Away at 102

EAST GREENSBORO, N.C. (Jan. 27, 2025) – Professor Emeritus Samuel J. Dunn, who led the Department of Plant Science and Technology in the College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical state University for 35 years, passed away Thursday, Jan. 9. He was 102.

Dunn joined N.C. A&T’s faculty in 1957 as chairman of the plant science department, now known as the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Design, having earned his B.S.  from Hampton University in 1948, where he was also a founding member of the Gamma Epsilon chapter of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity; his master’s degree in soil science from Michigan State University in 1951 and his doctorate in agronomy, with a minor in chemistry, from Oregon State University in 1957.  

Before his retirement in 1992, Dunn transformed the department from a technology-oriented program to a research-intensive one. He developed the Master of Science program and laid the foundation for the accreditation of both the biological engineering program (then known as agricultural engineering,) and the landscape architecture program, which today remains the nation’s only undergraduate landscape architecture program to be housed at a historically Black college or university.

He received funding that led to the construction of two buildings at the N.C. A&T University Farm for plant breeding, environmental and water quality studies, and developed both a soil chemistry laboratory and a soil microbiology laboratory within the department. He worked with Godfrey Uzochukwu, Ph.D., to expand the Earth and Environmental Sciences program for all majors., and supported the establishment of the Interdisciplinary Waste Management Institute, of which Uzochukwu is founding director. At one point during his tenure, the department had the highest number of Ph.D.-degreed faculty at the university.

“He was a visionary and an impactful chairperson,” Uzochukwu said.

Dunn received numerous awards and was inducted into the college’s Agriculture Hall of Fame in 2019.

Leon Moses, who retired as superintendent of the University Farm in 2022, remembers Dunn as not only an academic, but as a mentor.

“He took me under his wing and kept me there, not only through college but through my career at A&T,” said Moses, who earned a degree in plant science in 1980. “Not only did he make sure I got my degree and did well in the process, but he also made sure I got my first job in his department.”

Moses recalled a time when Dunn’s keen eye for quality saved his job when his first supervisor thought Moses wasn’t making the grade.

“(The supervisor) attempted to terminate me,” Moses said. “Dr. Dunn came to the farm on a day after a major rain and found me working in muddy boots and wet clothing. He instructed me to get into the car and refused to allow me to change into appropriate clothing. He carried me to the dean’s office, just as I was, and told Dean Webb that he wanted him to see what a hardworking man looked like and that if anybody needed to be terminated, it wasn’t Leon Moses.

“That was the pivot point in our relationship and in my career at A&T. Because of him, I served the university 24 years, first as research technician and then as farm superintendent for 18 years.”

Dunn called regularly, even after both had retired, Moses said. “Not only did he make a difference, he produced students who made a difference,” he said. “I am indebted, thankful and eternally grateful.”

“He was a great father,” said his son DeRome Dunn, Ph.D., an associate professor in A&T’s College of Engineering. “His laughter, sense of humor and enduring love of agriculture will remain embedded in the hearts of the students he mentored, the faculty and staff he supported, the dear friends he made, and his extended family.”

In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donating to the Samuel and Roxie Butler Dunn Endowed Scholarship Fund in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Design at N.C. A&T State University.