Marcel Dubuisson
Marcel Dubuisson was chosen as rector in 1953, at a time when two laws considerably altered the configuration of state universities. The rector's term of office was also extended to 4 years. Dubuisson served for four and a half years, resigning in 1971. One of his major achievements was undoubtedly the creation of the Sart Tilman campus.
Born in Olsene on April 5, 1903, Marcel Dubuisson studied and began his career at the University of Ghent. He was awarded a doctorate in Zoological Sciences in 1925. An assistant the following year, he was appointed head of the anatomy department of the Ghent Faculty of Medicine in 1928. In the meantime, he accepted a position at the École des Hautes Études (1926-1931). In 1928, he also obtained a mandate as a qualified researcher from the FNRS.
But the rest of his career was spent in Liège, where, in 1931, he took on a lectureship in general biology for undergraduates in chemical sciences. He got his modest foot in the door in Liège, because the scientific environment was renowned in zoology, whose Institute was led by brilliant personalities since Professor Van Beneden.
In 1936, he was appointed full professor, but the war shattered his career. Considered dangerous by the occupying forces, he was banned from teaching and imprisoned in 1941. In 1947, after these difficult years, Professor Désiré Damas, who had been granted emeritus status, freed him to teach zoology, and Marcel Dubuisson became his main successor.
A specialist in muscle-building physiology, Marcel Dubuisson earned himself an international reputation in the field, highlighted by numerous distinctions. Nor is it possible here to mention the extent of his scientific network and the structures of which he was a member, such as the Royal Academy of Belgium and the Physiological Society of London.
Soon, however, the man of science revealed the stature of a powerful rector of exceptional longevity. Chosen for the highest academic office in 1953, he was re-elected four times, for a total of 18 years of uninterrupted rectorship, until September 1971. He literally carried the destiny of the University of Liège from the post-war years to the end of the Golden Sixties.
Over such a long period, Dubuisson's rectorial activities were necessarily multi-faceted, the main ones being the stimulation of cultural activities within the University, notably with the University Choir, or the development of an oceanographic station in Calvi, Corsica (Stareso). In this context of support for oceanography, on the initiative of Rector Dubuisson, a major scientific mission from Liège was led in 1967 to the Great Barrier Reef off Australia. As early as 1952, Dubuisson initiated the renovation of the Institute of Zoology, and a aquarium and museum were opened to the public in 1963.
With the University of Liège playing an increasingly international role, Marcel Dubuisson became heavily involved in Central Africa, in the Congo, helping to set up the University of Elisabethville - now Lubumbashi - in 1955. The following year, he laid the foundations for the Fondation de l'Université de Liège pour les recherches scientifiques en Afrique centrale (FULREAC).
His greatest achievement, however, was the design and creation of the Sart Tilman campus on the heights of Liège, a gigantic new space in the middle of nature dedicated to research, the development and dissemination of knowledge, and interaction with the business world.
Marcel Dubuisson became Rector in the same year as the famous 1953 law modifying university organization in Belgium and giving greater autonomy to the University of Liège and its Board of Directors. He resigned as rector a few days before the March 1971 law reforming university administrative boards in the wake of the events of 1968, a law that concealed a new, modified method of financing universities, calculated on the basis of student numbers. Openly hostile to this new reality in the university landscape, Marcel Dubuisson bowed out. This new world was no longer his.
He died in Liège on October 25, 1974.
J'adresse mon admiration aux étudiants qui suivent les cours théoriques debout, assis par terre ou dans les couloirs, à ceux qui assistent aux travaux pratiques dans des locaux où, par l'insuffisance des ventilations, des fumées toxiques leur arrachent des toux irritantes, ...
aux professeurs et assistants qui poursuivent dans une misère de locaux indescriptible des recherches qui font honneur à notre Maison, en se servant d'instruments protégés contre les chutes de plâtras par des étançons et des bâches. Que de grandeur dans cette affreuse misère!
Extrait du Discours de rentrée académique d'octobre 1959, où le recteur Dubuisson dévoile le projet de transfert de l'université au Sart Tilman. Un domaine de 172 ha a en effet été acquis par l'État au mois de mars précédent, au profit de l'Université, qui compte cette année-là plus de 4500 étudiants.
Academic procession at the University's 150th anniversary celebration in downtown Montreal, in the presence of H.M. King Baudouin, followed by a tour of the first Sart Tilman buildings and a scale model of the entire project.
