Walter Light Hall
Walter Light Hall was built because of a 1983 study conducted on the campus, which attempted to discover the most urgent space requirements of the University. The study concluded that the Department of Electrical Engineering, which was at the time located in Fleming Hall, was by far the most over-crowded, and was in desperate need of new facilities.

The most logical solution seemed to be to erect a new building beside Goodwin Hall, which housed the closely related Department of Computer and Information Science as well as the Department of Mining Engineering. The plans were made before a single dollar of funding was in place, but as usual everything seemed to work out for the best. A $2.3 million donation from the estate of Queen's alumnus Joseph Stauffer got the ball rolling, and further monies from the Ontario government and other alumni made the project a reality. The building was completed in 1989 and is not only beside Goodwin Hall but connected to it on every floor. This "technology centre," as it was called at first, is named in honour of Walter Frederick Light.

Walter Light
Walter Frederick Light was an Ontario native and a graduate of Queen's, who obtained his B.Sc. in 1949. Dr. Light was a prominent businessman who worked for Bell Canada for 25 years and then became the President of Northern Telecom in 1974. He served as CEO and Chair of Nortel for several years, and he helped give Nortel a more globally-oriented mission and become a technology leader.

Dr. Light also served as the Chairman of the Board of Trustees from 1985-1990, and his contributions to Queen's were recognized by the naming of the technology centre in his honour in 1989. Dr. Light was married to another Queen's graduate, Margaret Light, and received an honourary LL.D. from Queen's in 1981.