In Memoriam: Lawrence “Larry” Knowles

Larry Knowles, Wellesley College’s machinist, died on Feb. 23 after a long illness.

Larry’s journey as a machinist began one night in the early 1980s, when he was working at a Cumberland Farms convenience store. A customer came in and, apparently impressed with how Larry was handling a particularly busy moment, slid his business card across the counter at checkout.

“He said, ‘If you ever need a job, you come see me,’” Larry recalled in an interview for the College’s website in 2021. “I think it was because of the manner in which I was working. I was hustling. It may just have been by happenstance. The guy liked the way I worked.”

That encounter changed the course of his life. The customer owned a shop specializing in machining and precision sheet metals, including the kind of metals that housed computers at the time. Larry took him up on his offer and soon after began apprenticing with him in his shop. He worked his way up to manager, and then for nearly two decades worked for the Center for Astrophysics, which is jointly run by Harvard and the Smithsonian.

Larry came to Wellesley because he wanted to work with students, and his joy in doing that work was palpable. His role included teaching students in engineering and physics classes how to do basic machining and collaborating with faculty and students in many departments to advance their research by designing custom parts. One of his lasting contributions to the College was his work with the students to design the plant hanger that is used in the Global Flora Conservatory to display potted plants on the north wall. He was awarded a U.S. patent for this work.

Larry said in the article for the College’s website that he enjoyed watching students light up after they built something in the shop. “It’s the accomplishment. That ability to do something that they’ve never done before,” he said. “It’s great, watching that progression, and opening the door for them, in the outside world.”

Larry was a co-winner of the 2019 College’s HR Agent of Innovation Award for his work that supported the Science Center construction project. President Paula Johnson said in announcing the honor, “Time and time again, they have teamed up to figure out ways to protect and transport some of our most delicate specimens and instruments across campus, whether transferring a massive fossilized tree stump safely to its new home in Global Flora, or developing and successfully implementing a plan to transport our NMR spectrometer—one of our most expensive and sensitive instruments.” Cathy Summa ’83, director of the Science Center, has referred to him as a “generational talent.” He will be deeply missed.