Austin E. Knowlton
Established in 2010 with a gift from the Austin E. Knowlton Foundation to support undergraduate and graduate students who are enrolled in the Austin E. Knowlton School. Preference is given to candidates from Ohio.
Mr. Austin E. Knowlton, also known as “Dutch”, was the owner and Chairman of the Knowlton Construction Company, an organization started in Bellefontaine, Ohio, in 1937 and whose predecessors dated back to 1906. Mr. Knowlton, through his company, was responsible for over 600 major and significant construction projects throughout Ohio and the Midwest, including school buildings, hospitals, libraries, and post offices. Mr. Knowlton was a 1927 graduate of Bellefontaine High School in Logan County, Ohio and The Ohio State University, class of 1931, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in Architectural Engineering.
Austin E. Knowlton as a senior at Ohio State in 1931
He became an avid sportsman with a 50-year interest in saddlebred horses, an original founding partnership of the Cincinnati Bengals where he served as Chairman, a major ownership interest for many years in the Cincinnati Reds, and a trusteeship of the Little Brown Jug Society for harness racing in Delaware, Ohio. Both Ohio State’s School of Architecture and its airport terminal and flight school are named in his honor. Mr. Knowlton passed away in 2003.