If not for a William & Mary president in the 1960s, there would be no marine science program to benefit from the school’s recent largest financial gift. Davis Y. Paschall, the college’s president from 1960-1971, was instrumental in the development of the substantial academic programs of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science at Gloucester Point.
The Virginia Fisheries Laboratory was established in 1940 as a joint effort between W&M and the Virginia Commission on Fisheries (now the Virginia Marine Resources Commission). It was initially organized by Donald W. Davis, head of William & Mary’s biology department.
On Wednesday, the university announced that philanthropist Jane Batten had donated $100 million for enhancement of its marine science program — the largest gift in W&M’s 331-year history. The existing school will be renamed the Batten School of Coastal & Marine Sciences. Originally established “to pursue research and educational activities relative to the seafood industry of the state and to develop into a prominent center for the study of Marine Biology,” Paschall said in a 1970 report, the laboratory operated as a quasi-state agency.
When Paschall became president, master’s degrees in marine science were offered by the University of Virginia, Virginia Tech and William & Mary. Paschall took a recommendation from an outside study to urge the board of visitors in 1961 to create a school of marine science with the faculty also becoming staff members of th.