“A HELL OF A JOB GETTING IT SQUARED AROUND”
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P R E S I D E N C Y
Only months after Lawrence Kimpton returned to Hyde Park, Robert Hutchins decided to accept an offer from Paul G. Hoffman in December 1950 to assume a senior administrative position at the Ford Foundation, and he resigned from the chancellorship. 97 Hutchins’s sudden, but not unexpected, decision instantly created a sizable power vacuum at the University of Chicago, which had last seen a presidential search in 1929. Kimpton’s administrative service at Chicago, at Stanford, and again at Chicago made him a plausible candidate to succeed Hutchins. He was not a published scholar, but neither had Hutchins been a scholar. In contrast to Hutchins, Kimpton had no enemies on the faculty, he was widely admired by the trustees, and he had a close knowledge of the workings of the University that seemed pleasing and plausible. Kimpton was also a nationally competitive figure in that several other universities had made inquiries about his availability to become their president, so he enjoyed the aura of a rising young administrative star in whom the trustees might vest such prodigious responsibility. Finally, Kimpton was a thoughtful, well-spoken person with suitable academic credentials. He had civic courage, much common sense, and a genial wit. In contrast to the later alienation between the two men, Kimpton could also be seen by Robert Hutchins’s allies as one of their own, for Kimpton openly admitted that he had returned to Chicago because he wanted to work with Hutchins. Hence he could plausibly be viewed as a “Hutchins man” 97. A word about titles is in order here. From 1945 until 1961, the president’s official title was changed to that of chancellor. Hence, throughout his regime, Kimpton was addressed as chancellor. The board of trustees changed the designation back to the conventional title of president in 1961.