The Peggy and Charles Stephenson Research and Technology Center

The Peggy and Charles Stephenson Research and Technology Center. . The completion of the Peggy and Charles Stephenson Research and Technology Center marked an important milestone in the history of science, research and technology at the University of Oklahoma. It capped a decade in which the University led the Big Twelve Universities in the amount of federally funded research. It also was the first building to be completed on the South Research Campus of the University. In the same academic year the university crossed the $200 million mark in research and externally funded programs. The University of Oklahoma clearly had become one of the most important engines for economic progress as the state moved toward an economy based upon intellectual property and discovery. , Science, engineering, and technology have a long and proud history at the university dating back to Albert Heald Van Vleet who was hired by President David Ross Boyd in the fall of 1898. Van Vleet had earned a PhD at the University of Leipzig and then took an extra year of study at Johns Hopkins University. At the University of Oklahoma, the disciples of botany, zoology, physiology, anatomy, medicine, and geology can all trace their origins to his dedicated and multi-faceted instruction. , Sensing that by 2002, the University's research programs were in critical need of new facilities which could flexibly accommodate new initiatives, Peggy and Charles Stephenson of Tulsa made a lead gift of $6 million to build a new research and technology center. The Stephensons saw their gift as a catalyst for the development of a complete research campus to benefit not only the University but the entire state as well. , Charles Stephenson earned his degree from the University of Oklahoma in petroleum engineering in 1959 and went on to become one of the University's most distinguished alumni and valued advisors. He had served as chairman and CEO of Vintage Petroleum and as a leader in the energy industry. He has given generously of his time as a member of the Board of Visitors for the College of Engineering and to the Sarkeys Energy Center. Charles and Peggy Stephenson were founding donors of the Energy Center and together endowed a chair in petroleum engineering. Peggy Stephenson is a civic leader in Tulsa and has partnered with her husband in many philanthropic activities.