Robert L. Ketter (1929–1989), was an authority on earthquake engineering research and a former president of the State University of New York at Buffalo (UB). A graduate of Lehigh University, Ketter went to UB, then known as the University of Buffalo, in 1958 to inaugurate and head the school's Department of Civil Engineering. He went on to become the dean of UB's College of Engineering and Applied Sciences (CEAS) and became university president in 1970, after years of student unrest associated with the Vietnam War closed the campus during the spring semester.