Penn State's Prexy

Beyond his name--and the fact that he had a famous brother--few students or facultymen at Pennsylvania State College knew much about the man just appointed their president in 1950. True enough, Milton S. Eisenhower had been the successful head of Kansas State College for seven years, but the Penn Staters were still skeptical about how he might turn out. "The board of trustees," said the undergraduate newspaper, "can appoint a president, but only the students can make him 'prexy.' "

It did not take Milton Eisenhower long to make the grade. Ten months after he took over, the students officially awarded him the title traditionally reserved at Penn State only for presidents who have won the respect and affection of the campus. The honor was well deserved. Never before had Penn State known the prosperity or prestige that came to it under Milton Eisenhower.

Early Habit. The youngest (he is now 56) and most bookish of the Eisenhower brothers, Milton had already acquired the habit of success. After graduating from Kansas State College with a B.S. in journalism, he served as a U.S. vice consul two years in Scotland, later became special assistant to the Secretary of Agriculture under Calvin Coolidge. At 28 he was made the department's director of information. He stayed on even after Henry Wallace took over, rose through a succession of posts culminated by the associate directorship of OWI during the first years of World War II. Then, in 1943, he moved out of Washington to become president of Kansas State. There he remained until the call came from Pennsylvania.

Penn State soon got to know him not only as a prodigious worker but also as a man of breadth and tolerance. By 8:10 every morning he was in his office; by 9:30 his voluminous correspondence was out of the way, and he was ready for the day's business that often lasted into the night. In his first year he traveled 30,000 miles in Pennsylvania to find out what services his campus could render the state's agriculture and industry. He raised faculty salaries 35%, enlarged the library by 26%, put up the $3,000,000 Hetzel Union Building, a new research reactor building, an all-faith chapel. He raised the liberal-arts requirements for technology students. In 1953 Penn State officially became a university.

Unofficial Adviser. All this time Prexy Eisenhower was leading a double life. Almost every weekend he could be found in Washington, serving as the most trusted, if unofficial, of Dwight Eisenhower's advisers. He was a leader in the Administration's efforts to streamline the executive branch of the Government, toured South America as his brother's ambassador of good will. Once, when he left a meeting at the White House early, the President of the U.S. turned to his associates and said: "Gentlemen, the man who just left the room would most certainly be a member of my Cabinet except for one, just one, disqualifying factor. He happens to be my brother."

Last week, with no public warning, Milton Eisenhower announced that for "personal reasons", he would resign as president of Penn State. His decision, he said, had nothing to do with his brother's illness, and he was "not going to make any decision about the future until I've had a long fishing vacation." But to his colleagues, it was not conceivable that a man of Milton Eisenhower's talents would be lost to the academic world for long.

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