Lehigh’s Mountaintop Campus was originally home to Bethlehem Steel’s Homer Research Laboratory. The laboratory’s buildings covered approximately 75 acres atop South Mountain and housed the Bethlehem Steel researchers studying physics and metallurgy, chemistry, ceramics, chemical engineering and industrial health.

In 1987, following the decline of the steel giant, Lehigh purchased five of the eight buildings and 742 acres of land from the company for $18.75 million. This purchase connected the Asa Packer and Goodman campuses and provided 370,000 new square feet of floor space.

Today, Mountaintop Campus houses the College of Education, the department of biological sciences, the department of chemical and biomolecular engineering, the Health Research Hub, the Energy Research Center, and the ATLSS (Advanced Technology for Large Structural Systems) Center.

In 2013, Lehigh acquired two additional buildings at Mountaintop and, thanks to a $20 million gift from Scott Belair ’69, launched the innovative and student-driven Mountaintop initiative.