Dates

• Existence: 1817-1895
• Existence: 1817 - 1895

Biographical Note

Benjamin Franklin Greene was born into a farming family in Lebanon, New Hampshire, on October 25^th, 1817. He was the oldest of ten children. In 1841, while working in iron works in Brandon, Vermont, he applied for admission to the Rensselaer Institute, where he was accepted and entered that fall. The following October, Greene graduated with a Bachelor of Natural Science degree. After graduating, Greene taught mathematics and natural philosophy at Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland. In 1847, he returned to Rensselaer as Director of the Institute, where he became one of the school's most significant early administrators. He reorganized Rensselaer’s curriculum, modeling the changes after the contemporary European polytechnic institutes in Paris and Vienna. He had also wanted to implement a school for architecture at a time when there was no such schooling in America, but it was deemed too expensive. In 1929, Rensselaer did establish a school for architecture, and the building was named the Greene building, in his honor. In 1850, he formally became the Director of Rensselaer, and in 1851, he changed the name of Rensselaer Institute to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. However, the name change didn’t become official for another ten years. Greene resigned from the Institute in 1859, and in September of that year, he opened the Glenmore School of Engineers in Troy. Patterned after his ideas for the education of engineers, the new school also stressed the education of "practical men of business." The curriculum consisted of a preparatory course, a general course, and a technical course. The Glenmore venture was not successful, and officially ended in 1863 when Greene began a new career with the U.S. Navy. He served as chief clerk of the Bureau of Navigation, Professor of Mathematics, and Superintendent of Compasses, retiring in 1879. He died on November 22, 1895.

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