Demetrius Venable, PhD

Demetrius Venable is a native of Powhatan County and a 1966 graduate of Pocahontas High School. Dr. Venable received the BS degree in Physics from Virginia State College and the PhD in Physics from the American University in 1974. Following his graduate work, he was employed as a Senior Associate Engineer at IBM. In 1978, Dr. Venable joined the staff at Hampton University where he established the PhD program in physics, which was the first doctoral program at the University. At Hampton he held several administrative positions including department chairman, dean, vice president, and provost. In 1995 he accepted an appointment as a professor at Howard University where he served as chairman of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, taught courses in astronomy and in physics, served as the department’s planetarium and observatory director, and served as principal investigator on various funded research projects. Dr. Venable’s research involved the studying of interaction of light and matter, including radiative transfer modelling and remote sensing technologies. He was appointed Professor Emeritus upon his retirement in 2017.

Dr. Venable currently serves as President of Belmead on the James, Inc., as a member of the Powhatan County Board of Equalization, and as a member of the Boards of Directors of the Capital Region Land Conservancy. He joined the Free Clinic of Powhatan Board in 2018.