The White family papers include genealogical materials, land grants and deeds, commissions, and other documents of various family members; and photographs.
Photographs include portraits of Alfred Holmes White, alone and with his wife, Rebecca D. White; informal photographs of the Whites' fiftieth wedding anniversary celebration; and photograph of Alfred White with chemistry students at University of Michigan.
The White family is from both New York and Michigan. One of the more well-known members of the White family was Alfred Homes White.
White was born in Peoria, Illinois on April 12, 1873. He began his college studies at McGill University in Montreal, but soon transferred to the University of Michigan where he studied Latin, Greek, and Chemistry. He received his A.B. degree in 1893. For three years after his graduation, he was an assistant in chemistry at the University of Illinois. White then studied for a year at the Polytechnicum in Zurich, Switzerland, where he specialized in Chemical Technology.
In 1898, White returned to U-M to help establish the Department of Chemical Engineering, in which he taught chemical technology. While teaching, he continued his studies at U-M, receiving his B.S. in chemical engineering in 1904. That same year, White was appointed assistant professor, and full professor in 1911. In 1914, he was made head of the Department of Chemical Engineering.
From May 1917 to July 1919, White took a leave of absence from U-M to serve as captain and later lieutenant colonel in the Ordnance Department, U.S.A. Chief Research Section, Nitrate Division. He also served as a consultant to the Bureau of Mines.
White retired from U-M in 1943. He was made professor emeritus that same year, and later became president of the Emeritus Club. He received an honorary Doctorate of Engineering from the University of Detroit in 1948. White was also a member of a variety of clubs and societies, and was president of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers.
White married Rebecca Downey on July 28, 1903. They had two children; his son Alfred was head of the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Virginia until he died in 1936 at the age of twenty-eight. His daughter, Mary Julian, was a physician in Washington, D.C.
White died on August 25, 1953.
