Grover Meetze

Updated Friday, Feb. 12, 2010, 11:15 a.m.

Mr. Grover C. Meetze Jr. of of Hillside Drive, a Davidson College graduate who helped shape the college campus as college architect and physical plant director, died Thursday, Feb. 11, 2010. He was 87.

A memorial service is planned Monday, Feb 15, at 7:30 p.m. at Raymer Funeral Home chapel in Huntersville.

Mr. Meetze was born in Gaffney, S.C., and graduated from high school in 1940. During his lifetime, he was a musician, pilot, World War II veteran, industrial designer, chemist, scout master, architect, inventor, acoustician and American.

A 1955 chemistry graduate of Davidson College, Mr. Meetze was hired in 1957 as a construction supervisor and instructor in the physics department. Three years later he was appointed the college’s first director of physical plant, a job he eventually retired from.

Grover Meetze with a map of the Davidson College campus. (Davidson College news office photo)

During his 32 years at the college, he “helped shape the physical face” of the campus, according to a 1989 Davidson College news article announcing his retirement. He supervised construction of many buildings, including most of the college’s modern dorms, Dana Science Building, Cunningham Fine Arts Building, E.H. Little Library and the Baker Sports complex, and oversaw renovations at others.

He had a passion for recycling existing buildings, as happened in 1975 when the college converted the former Gray Library into a student union. He told a reporter in 1990: “My primary mission has been to take what historically was given to us and not let it be changed.”

After his retirement from Davidson, he worked in the college and university division of Little & Associates Architects, in Charlotte.

Mr. Meetze also was involved in local industry and town government. During and just after his student years (1948-57), he worked as a superintendent at Carolina Asbestos Co.’s Davidson mill, according to college records.

He also served on the Davidson Town Board in the 1960s and 1970s.

He was the husband of the late Florede Lipscomb Meetze, who died June 29, 1995. Mrs. Meetze had worked in the 1950s as a secretary for Davidson College’s deans of academic affairs and students.

Mr. Meetze is survived by one sister, one son (Grover C. Meetze III of Mooresville), two granddaughters, one great grandson and two great granddaughters.

Davidson College archivist Jan Blodgett and Bill Giduz of the college news office provided research for this article.

CORRECTION: Mr. Meetze served on the Town Board in the 1960s and 1970s. The orginal version of this article said only 1960s. For a historical list of town board members and mayors, see the town website.