Chemistry Graduate Martin Tant Leaves $100,000 to Endow Scholarship

October 01, 2015

Martin Tant (courtesy of Tant family)

The late Martin Ray Tant, a 1975 graduate of Old Dominion University, has bequeathed $100,000 to the University's College of Sciences to establish an endowed scholarship in chemistry.

Tant, 62, died Aug. 15 in Kingsport, Tenn.

Tant received his Bachelor of Science from Old Dominion and then earned a master's and Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Virginia Tech, to which he also bequeathed an endowed scholarship.

He was a macromolecular/biomedical specialist and engineer at Eastman Chemical for 26 years, retiring in 2015.

John Cooper, interim chair of Old Dominion's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, thanked Tant's family and added: "Dr. Tant's extensive research experience, ranging from polymers to nanocomposites, began as an undergraduate in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Old Dominion. We are proud that we will be able to honor him with an endowed scholarship in our department for undergraduate research."

Tant wrote three books in the macromolecular/biomedical field and published dozens of scientific articles. He was also a generous supporter of athletics at Old Dominion as well as Virginia Tech.

The "Dr. Martin Ray Tant Endowed Scholarship in Chemistry" is the fourth such fund in the department, and the largest. It joins the C.S. Sherwood III Endowment Fund for physics, geology and chemistry majors, the Dr. Allen K. Clark Endowed Scholarship in Chemistry, for students majoring in chemistry or organic chemistry, and the John Van Norman Endowment to support scholarships in chemistry and biochemistry, as well as to fund visiting lecturers to the department.