NORWICH, Vt. (AP) – Retired Dartmouth College professor Walter H. Stockmayer, a winner of the nation’s highest award for science, has died at the age of 90.

In 1987 Stockmayer received the Medal of Science from President Reagan, who touted him as one of the “the heroes of the modern age.”

Reagan cited Stockmayer for his “fundamental contributions to the physical chemistry of high polymers.”

Stockmayer grew up in Rutherford, N.J. In 1935 he graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he won a Rhodes scholarship.

He received his doctorate in chemistry in 1940. During World War II, he contributed to classified war research projects while at Columbia University.

He joined the faculty at MIT in 1952 and moved to Dartmouth in 1961. He retired in 1979, but continued to teach and advise at Dartmouth.

undergraduate and graduate students through 2002.

His personal interests included mountain climbing, music and travel. He was a lifelong member of the Appalachian Mountain Club.

His wife of 64 years, Sylvia, died in 2002. He is survived by two sons, a sister, eight grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

AP-ES-05-11-04 1604EDT