RICHARDS, Robert Hallowell (1844— ). An American mining engineer and metallurgist. He was born at Gardiner, Maine, graduated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1868, and in 1871 was appointed its professor of mineralogy and metallurgy. He was a member of the United States Assay Commission in 1897, and attained prominence as a legal expert in chemical and metallurgical cases. He wrote Aluminum (1887).