During his 35-year tenure as University of Notre Dame president, the Rev. Theodore Hesburgh carried through on bold ideas that supporters say reshaped a college known mostly for its football team into a prominent academic institution.
The Rev. Hesburgh died Thursday night at age 97 on Notre Dame’s South Bend, Ind., campus, according to the university.
The Rev. Hesburgh, who became president in 1952, is credited with a number of accomplishments, including the decision to admit women students in 1972 and building the university’s endowment from $9 million to $350 million when he stepped down in 1987.
He also was a leader in the civil rights movement and on other social issues, including immigration reform and peaceful use of atomic energy. He was awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Lyndon Johnson in 1964, and a Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.
“When he became president, (Notre Dame) was a small school known for football primarily. I don’t think anybody would say it was among the top universities in the country,” said the Rev. John Jenkins, Notre Dame’s current president “But he envisioned a truly great Catholic University. What Father Ted gave Notre Dame was a real, bold vision in so many ways.”
The Rev. Hesburgh recruited additional faculty members and felt building the endowment would enhance the school’s academic credibility, Jenkins said. “He said many times … the best universities have the biggest endowments,” Jenkins said.
During the Rev. Hesburgh’s time as president, the school grew from less than 5,000 students and 389 faculty members to 9,600 students and a faculty of 950.
He faced opposition as he championed the idea of turning Notre Dame into a coed university.
“We look back on that and it seems obvious,” said Jenkins, a Notre Dame undergraduate in the 1970s. “But at that time there was opposition.”
Retired writer and Notre Dame graduate Ann Therese Palmer of Lake Forest collaborated with the Rev. Hesburgh on “Thanking Father Ted: Thirty-Five Years of Notre Dame Coeducation,” a collection of essays by female alumnae.
Palmer said she was hosting a lunch for him in 2006 when she came up with the idea for women to write him letters. “We should say thank you to him,” Palmer recalled thinking. “If it wasn’t for Father Ted, we wouldn’t be here.”
At the lunch, Palmer handed him four binders full of more than 500 letters, she said. There are 325 of those letters in the book, which benefited a scholarship program at Notre Dame, Palmer said.
In an interview that is also part of the book, Palmer asked the Rev. Hesburgh about the decision to admit women to Notre Dame, which he told her was stuck in a “locker room attitude.”
“If Notre Dame had one big failing, it was the fact it was only addressing half of the Catholic Church. If we’re in the education business … in the Catholic church in America, we can’t say we are doing this and ignoring half of the American Catholic population,” he said. “So, I began to make a few noises. It was obvious this was not going to be an easy thing to do.”
Palmer, a 1973 Notre Dame graduate who met the Rev. Hesburgh as a student, said he was like a “second father” who told hilarious stories and liked to smoke cigars. “Just like a good dad, Father Ted was always available to us,” Palmer said.
The Rev. Hesburgh was born in 1917 in Syracuse, N.Y., the second of five children. From the time he was 6, he wanted to be a priest, according to the university. He came to Notre Dame in 1934, joining the Holy Cross Seminary. After three years, he left for Rome, where he earned his bachelor’s degree from the Gregorian University. He was ordained a priest in 1943. He later earned a doctorate from the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.
Notre Dame’s library, which he oversaw being built, is named after him, as is the school’s auditorium. His name also is on scholarships and professorships, Jenkins said.
The Rev. Hesburgh did have critics. Some said he spent too much time off campus. He was chided for implementing a “15-minute rule” for students protesting the Vietnam War. Those who disrupted campus operations would be given 15 minutes of meditation to stop what they were doing or face expulsion.
But the Rev. Hesburgh was largely celebrated for his work not only at Notre Dame but throughout the country. “He was one of the key figures on so many issues in the United States and the Catholic Church,” Jenkins said.
And, while academics and social issues were his focus, Notre Dame’s athletic leaders also praised him.
“It is hard to overstate the impact that Father Hesburgh had on the landscape of American higher education and collegiate athletics,” said Jack Swarbrick, Notre Dame’s athletic director. “In regard to the latter, Father Ted’s leadership in the areas of civil rights, gender equity and presidential control of college athletics changed college sports for the better and created a road map that we at Notre Dame continue to follow to this day.”
Before the Rev. Hesburgh came to Notre Dame, the football team did not participate in post-season bowl games, under the theory such contests would interfere with higher learning, Jenkins said. The Rev. Hesburgh led the school and its football team “into the modern era,” Jenkins said.
Mike Brey, men’s basketball coach, said the team plans to wear a commemorative patch for the remainder of the season to honor the Rev. Hesburgh. Brey, who came to the school in 2000, recalls having lunches with Hesburgh.
“We’d smoke a cigar and I would just listen,” Brey said. “I always left there feeling more confident about the job I was assigned to do than when I went in there. He had a magical touch of helping you feel like you were really good. I just loved listening to the stories.”
“I think we all thought he was going to live forever.”
Services are planned for Tuesday and Wednesday at the university.
The Associated Press contributed.
kthayer@tribpub.com
Twitter @knthayer
