Fred Mason Roddy, a mechanical engineer, graduated from the university in 1927. He went to work for the Eastman Company in Kingsport. He invented a machine for granulating, dicing, and pelletizing plastic and founded Cumberland Engineering Company in Kingsport in 1939. He moved the company to the Providence, Rhode Island, area in 1940, and the plant was located in nearby Attleboro, Massachusetts. The company remains a large supplier of machinery for plastics manufacturing. Roddy died in 1969, leaving the university an outright bequest of $500,000 and establishing a foundation, which has continued to support the scholarship program of the university. By 1998 more than four thousand Fred M. Roddy Scholarships had been awarded. His twin brother, Frank (’27), and his sister Lucille were also UT alums.
Written by Betsey B. Creekmore [Brad Alsup contributed.]