Morrill to Minnesota

When the trustees of the University of Wyoming invited James Lewis Morrill to come out and talk over their presidency in 1941, he demurred at first, finally consented only because he could make it a vacation trip by visiting a friend. Once there, he fell in love with the country, took the job.

He had an unusual background for an educator. One of the first college men (Ohio State '13) to be hired by the Scripps-Howard newspaper chain, he rose to be managing editor of the Cleveland Press, left it in 1919, returned to his alma mater as alumni secretary. He became Ohio State's vice president in 1932.

The president of a State university, must be primarily a politician, only secondarily an educator. At Wyoming, polished, personable President Morrill proved his mettle by cleaning up a political mess which had brought university morale to an alltime low. He also persuaded Wyoming's politically potent ranchers that cultural subjects at Laramie were not just academic woolgathering. So swiftly did his fame spread that in the past year he has been offered ten other university presidencies. Last week he accepted the eleventh offer: from big University of Minnesota (peacetime enrollment: 17,000).

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