One of Knox College’s longest serving faculty members, Ross Vander Meulen, Professor Emeritus of German, passed away on Tuesday, April 25, 2023, at the age of 87. In a distinguished and multifaceted career spanning more than four decades at Knox, Vander Meulen taught three languages, served in the academic administration, and even briefly coached cross country.
Vander Meulen taught German from 1968 through 2000. He occasionally taught Latin and English, chaired the Modern Languages Department, and from 1979 to 1983 served as Associate Dean of the College. After his retirement, he continued teaching advanced courses in German.
He is survived by his wife, Kay, two children and their spouses, four grandchildren, nieces and nephews.
“Ross was a fixture on Knox’s campus for over 50 years,” said Todd Heidt, Professor of German, Director of the Stellyes Center for Global Studies, and Chair of the International Studies program at Knox. “For much of that half-century, Ross was the heart and soul of the German program. Even after retiring in 2000, he continued to teach a course or two a year into the 2010s and ate lunch regularly at German Table, right up to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. His ability to quote literature from memory was often on display at German Table—whether it was Goethe’s great insights into life or one-liners from Mark Twain’s essay, ‘The Awful German Language.’ As that anecdote suggests, he had a great sense of humor, too. His passion for all things German was absolutely infectious, and he thrived off of interacting with students and fellow faculty. Ross touched every part of campus over his time at Knox, and Knox was all the better for it.”
Vander Meulen wrote scholarly articles on a wide range of topics from his specialty in 18th century German literature, to the Dutch philosopher Erasmus and Protestant theologian Martin Luther, and the application of mathematical logic to German and English vocabularies. He also wrote short stories, which he presented at public readings on the Knox campus.
An avid runner and cyclist, Vander Meulen briefly coached Knox’s cross-country team in the 1970s. In his honor, the team dubbed themselves “Vandy’s Dandies.”
A keen observer of campus life and national politics, Vander Meulen wrote an essay in 1972, “The College’s Role in Revolution,” which placed events of the 1960s into a perspective that stretched back more than 400 years to student riots that occurred in Germany during the Protestant Reformation.
“My first class with him was very challenging, Introduction to German Literature,” recalled Gary Schmidt ’89, Professor of German and Dean of the College of Liberal Arts at Wright State University in Ohio, and a visiting professor at Knox in 2001. “Without that experience and the push to expand my vocabulary and reading knowledge, I doubt I would have gone on to become a fluent German speaker and eventually a professor of German. During my senior year, Professor Vander Meulen agreed to do an independent study with me on Goethe; I fondly remember the hours sitting in his office talking about the poetry, drama, and fiction of Germany’s greatest writer. It was such a pleasure returning to Knox in 2001 as a colleague of my former professor, and I marveled at how active he was even in retirement, coming to the weekly German Table lunch conversations in the cafeteria.”
Vander Meulen earned his bachelor’s degree in English at Northwestern University, master’s degrees in English and German, and a doctorate in German at the University of Michigan. In 1971, he was awarded the Philip Green Wright-Lombard College Award, which is Knox’s highest honor for teaching. In 1991-92, he coordinated the installation of a new computerized language learning center at Knox, supported by a grant from the Booth-Ferris Foundation.