Not many people can say that their former chemistry professor is also in the Falcon Legends Hall of Fame. Uniquely positioned in academics and athletics, Dr. Wes Lingren ’52 brought his gifts and talents to Seattle Pacific College on the basketball and tennis courts as a talented player and later as a beloved chemistry professor, dedicated coach, and advocate for collegiate athletics.
Lingren’s story with Seattle Pacific began in 1949 when he was recruited to play basketball. He was encouraged to go to college by his father, who owned a construction business in Lingren’s hometown of Pasadena, Calif. He had a lot of friends from high school who went to SPC and they had great things to say about the college, so the opportunity to play basketball on a scholarship at a well-respected Christian institution felt like an answered prayer.
“My college experience was wonderful — I had no idea what I was getting myself into,” Lingren said.
He quickly made a place — or several — for himself at Seattle Pacific, balancing his athletic talents between basketball in the winter and tennis in the spring.
He studied chemistry, developing close relationships with his professors. That is … singular professor, as there was only one in the entire chemistry department at the time.
Lingren graduated from Seattle Pacific in 1952, then completed a fellowship at the University of Washington and two years in the army before a friend inspired him to start teaching chemistry at Pasadena Nazarene College. After a few years, he returned to Seattle and Seattle Pacific — the chemistry department doubled once Lingren began teaching in the department.
Many faculty at the time both taught and coached sports, so it was inevitable that Lingren would too. When he was asked to coach tennis, he accepted the position as “he thought it would be nice to be outside in the springtime.”
“It turned out to be a wonderful chapter in my life,” said Lingren.
The University was impacted by a phenomenon of a shrinking male population at Christian colleges all over the country at the time, so Lingren became passionate about recruiting men to join the tennis team. He ultimately nurtured the talents of two nationally ranked tennis teams within his last coaching years at Seattle Pacific.
After years of investing his passion into the athletic department, he became a respected and trusted leader.
“I saw the need to ‘spruce up’ the athletic department.” And spruce it up he did. As the interim athletic director for one year and NCAA faculty representative for 25 years, he supported initiatives to add women’s varsity teams to the Falcon sports community and brought forth the case for upgrading and expanding athletics facilities.
As a professor, Lingren laid out a firm — and new — foundation for Seattle Pacific’s academics. In 1970, he founded the University Scholars program after attending a higher education conference and noticing the importance of honors programs at other universities. He succeeded amidst financial restrictions and initial challenges in forming the curriculum, setting a precedent for academic excellence that has persisted beyond his departure from Seattle Pacific.
Lingren formally retired from SPU in 1998 and was honored to join the Emeriti Faculty. In 2006, he was inducted into the Falcon Hall of Fame for his legacy in improving the athletics department.
Lingren has maintained a close relationship with the Seattle Pacific community beyond the conclusion of his teaching and athletic career. He poured time and love into writing a book with his colleagues and friends titled, Go Birds!: A Concise History of Varsity Athletics at Seattle Pacific University 1933–2017. This book, consisting of archival pictures and information, chronicles how Seattle Pacific sports changed over the years.
These days, Lingren enjoys his retirement in Bellevue, Wash., where he loves spending time with friends and cross-stitching (he’s completed more than 50 projects – many given as gifts!). He and his late wife, Merrilyn, have two children, Libby and Eric, who are both SPU alumni with kids of their own.
(A similar version of this story was originally published in the Winter 2025 issue of Significance, the newsletter of the Office Endowments and Gift Planning.)