Arthur Allan Patchett ’51

Art graduated from Middletown (N.Y.) High School. At Princeton, he majored in chemistry, graduating summa cum laude and was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He was a member of Court Club, roomed with Buzz Pohlmann, and was a coxswain on our crew for three years. 

Following Princeton he attended Cambridge for two years on a Fulbright, earned a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Harvard, and spent two years working on the design of medicinally important compounds at the National Institutes of Health. 

He joined Merck in 1957 to begin a 44-year career that brought him many awards and honors as a widely renowned research chemist. He was directly involved in the discovery of the hypertension drugs Vasotec and Prinivil and the cholesterol-lowering drug Mevacor. He was author or co-author of 160 publications and 175 U.S. patents. His pioneering work in the discovery of statin helped save millions of lives around the world. He also took a leadership role in the American Chemical Society’s Medicinal Chemistry Division. 

Predeceased by his wife, Lois, Art died Dec. 2, 2022, in New Providence, N.J. He is survived by two sons.