Aerospace engineering expert

Served at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base

Professor and college administrator in Ohio

STEM education innovator

Dr. Clark E. Beck graduated from Marion High School in 1947. He lettered in football and track for four years. He went to the state finals in the long jump in his junior year and with the mile relay team as a senior. In 1951 he graduated with a bachelor of science in mathematics from Virginia Union University. Clark went on to the University of Cincinnati and in 1955 graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering. He had an illustrious 33-year career as a civilian research engineering manager at Wright- Patterson Air Force Base. In 1969 he obtained his master’s degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Cincinnati, which also bestowed an honorary doctor of science degree on him in 2003.
Clark taught evening and Saturday classes at Sinclair Community College and Central State University while he worked at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. After his retirement from Wright-Patterson, he became assistant dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Science at Wright State University near Dayton, Ohio. In 1987, while at Wright State, he designed and implemented the Wright STEPP (Science and Engineering Precollege Program) to prepare women and minorities in the Dayton Public School System for careers in science and engineering. That program was President George H.W. Bush’s 384th Daily Point of Light in 1991.
Always active in the community, Clark has served as president of the Engineers Club of Dayton, the Ohio Society of Professional Engineers, the Engineering and Science Foundation of Dayton, the City of Dayton Environmental Advisory Board, and the Engineers Foundation of Ohio; vice president of the National Society of Professional Engineers; treasurer of the Miami Valley Fair Housing Center; secretary of the Dayton Chapter of the American Red Cross and the Order of the Engineer; and a member of the Samaritan Health Foundation Board and the University of Cincinnati Foundation Board of Trustees; a volunteer for the United Way; and other community service positions.