20 Notable alumni of Colorado School of Mines
Updated: June 22, 2026 EliteDegrees
Colorado School of Mines is ranked #682 in the world and #198 in United States by aggregated alumni prominence. Below is the list of 20 notable alumni from Colorado School of Mines sorted by their wiki pages popularity. The directory includes famous graduates and former students along with research and academic staff. Many individuals affiliated with Colorado School of Mines won Nobel Prizes for Peace, in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, and Economics.
1. Howard W. Leaf
1923-2009 (aged 86)
military personnel
Howard Wesley Leaf was a lieutenant general in the United States Air Force. He served as a fighter pilot during the Korean War and Vietnam War and retired as assistant vice chief of staff at the Pentagon in 1984.
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2. Arthur S. Adams
1896-1980 (aged 84)
academic
Arthur Stanton Adams was an American academic who served as the eighth president of the University of New Hampshire. He also served as Assistant Dean of Engineering and Director of the Engineering Science Management War Training Program and Provost at Cornell University. In 1948, he was appointed the eighth president of the University of New Hampshire in Nashua, New Hampshire.
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3. Jan Miller
1942-. (aged 84)
chemist
metallurgist
engineer
Jan Dean Miller is an American engineer, currently Distinguished Professor of metallurgical engineering and Ivor D. Thomas Endowed Chair at University of Utah.
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4. Craig Thompson
1986-. (aged 40)
association football player
Craig Thompson is an American soccer player who currently plays for Real Colorado Foxes in the USL Premier Development League.
5. Kennda Lynch
1975-. (aged 51)
astrobiologist
geomicrobiologist
Kennda Lian Lynch is an American astrobiologist and geomicrobiologist who studies polyextremophiles. She has primarily been affiliated with NASA. She identifies environments on Earth with characteristics that may be similar to environments on other planets, and creates models that help identify characteristics that would indicate an environment might host life. Lynch also identifies what biosignatures might look like on other...
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6. Charles Arthur Banks
1885-1961 (aged 76)
entrepreneur
politician
Charles Arthur Banks, CMG was the 17th Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia.
7. John P. Allen
1929-. (aged 97)
explorer
John Polk Allen is a systems ecologist, engineer, metallurgist, adventurer, and writer. Allen is a proponent of the science of biospherics and a pioneer in sustainable co-evolutionary development. He is the founder of Synergia Ranch, and is best known as the inventor and director of research of Biosphere 2, the world's largest vivarium and research facility to study global ecology....
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8. Robert H. Waterman, Jr
1936-2022 (aged 86)
business theorist
Robert Hanna Waterman Jr. was an American non-fiction author and expert on business management practices.
9. William M. Ketchum
1921-1978 (aged 57)
politician
William Matthew Ketchum was an American businessman and Republican Party politician who was a member of the California State Assembly from 1967 to 1973 and a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1973 until his death.
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10. Wendell Fertig
1900-1975 (aged 75)
engineer
civil engineer
Wendell Fertig was an American civil engineer, in the American-administered Commonwealth of the Philippines, who organized and commanded an American-Filipino guerrilla force on the Japanese-occupied, southern Philippine island of Mindanao during World War II. Fertig's widely scattered guerrilla force numbered approximately 32,000. He faced about 50,000 Japanese soldiers, mostly garrison troops in towns and cities.
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11. Sao Kya Hseng
1924-1962 (aged 38)
mining engineer
politician
agronomist
Sao Kya Seng or Sao Kya Hseng was a politician, a mining engineer, an agriculturalist and the last Saopha of Hsipaw State, Myanmar, from 1947 to 1959.
12. Randy A. George
1964-. (aged 62)
army officer
Randy Alan George is a United States Army general who has served as the 41st chief of staff of the United States Army since 2023. He most recently served as the 38th vice chief of staff of the United States Army from 2022 to 2023, and previously served as the senior military assistant to the United States secretary of defense...
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13. Antônio ErmÃrio de Moraes
1928-2014 (aged 86)
author
engineer
businessperson
Antônio ErmÃrio de Moraes was a Brazilian billionaire businessman and the chairman of the Votorantim Group, one of the country's largest companies, focused on metals, paper, cement and frozen orange juice. He was the grandfather of IndyCar Series driver Mario Moraes.
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14. Shane Carwin
1975-. (aged 51)
mixed martial arts fighter
Shane Bannister Carwin is an American former mixed martial artist who competed in the Heavyweight division of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), where he is a former Interim UFC Heavyweight Champion. He is considered to be one of the hardest hitting athletes to ever fight in the UFC.
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15. Arden L. Bement, Jr
1932-. (aged 94)
engineer
Arden Lee Bement Jr. is an American engineer and scientist and has served in executive positions in government, industry and academia.
16. George Saunders
1958-. (aged 68)
university teacher
journalist
geophysicist
fantasy author
writer
George Saunders is an American writer. He is best known for his short stories and his novel Lincoln in the Bardo (2017), which won the Booker Prize. Saunders' short stories have been published as several collections, including CivilWarLand in Bad Decline (1996) and Tenth of December: Stories (2013).
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17. Frank J. Shakespeare
1925-2022 (aged 97)
diplomat
businessperson
Francis Joseph Shakespeare was an American diplomat, political consultant and media executive. He was a vice president of the CBS network, and an executive vice president, before entering public service. He served as the United States ambassador to Portugal from 1985 to 1986 and the United States ambassador to the Holy See from 1986 to 1989. He later served as...
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18. Derrick Jensen
1960-. (aged 66)
writer
environmentalist
novelist
philosopher
Derrick Jensen is an American environmental activist, author and ecophilosopher in the anarcho-primitivist tradition. He believes that human civilization is and has always been unsustainable for the planet.
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19. Purnomo Yusgiantoro
1951-. (aged 75)
civil servant
academic
head commissioner
commissioner
Purnomo Yusgiantoro is an Indonesian politician. He served as Minister of Defense in the Second United Indonesia Cabinet from 2009 to 2014. Previously, he served as Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources from 2000 to 2009. He also served as secretary-general of OPEC in 2004.
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20. Souad Naji Al-Azzawi
1953-. (aged 73)
academic
scientist
university teacher
postdoctoral researcher
Souad Naji Al-Azzawi is an Iraqi environmentalist and academic researcher in various engineering disciplines, in addition to having established and assisted in the establishment of multiple research & academic institutions in Iraq. With more than 50 published scientific papers on topics ranging from water desalination, nuclear waste management, and Depleted Uranium contamination among others, she is a distinguished member of...
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