Jean P. Mather *51

Jean P. Mather, the outspoken president of the University of Massachusetts from 1954 to 1960, died June 21, 2007. He was 92.

Mather helped transform an agricultural college into a university of national status. During his tenure, the College of Arts and Sciences was founded, and the schools of nursing and education were established.

A direct descendant of Cotton Mather (the influential Puritan minister in the late 1600s and early 1700s), he earned a bachelor's from the University of Denver, and then was an ensign in the Navy during World War II. After the war, he earned an MBA from the University of Denver, and then a master's in economics from Princeton.

Berating the Massachusetts legislature at a public hearing in 1959 for refusing to increase salaries at the university, he stated, "It will profit us nothing to build a lot of bright new tin cans and then fill them with half-baked beans." The pay increase was then approved. After leaving Massachusetts, he was at several other schools before retiring in 1980.

Preceded in death by his first wife, Marie, he is survived by his second wife, Harriet, whom he married in 1981, and one daughter, Barbara L. Johnson.