Randolph Bromery was Chancellor of the University of Massachusetts from 1971 until 1979.  After he retired from that position, he became the go-to guy for troubled or scandal-wracked institutions in the Commonwealth. If a campus was destroying itself from within, Chancellor Bromery would ride to the rescue–and fix things, for real.

I stood in awe of Chancellor Bromery for his work as a university and college president, and his uncanny ability to command respect and improve any situation in which he became involved.  As I read the obituary on the UMass Amherst website, my admiration for this great man grew as I learned things about his life–his military service, his pre-academic career, his role in acquiring the papers of WEB du Bois for the university’s library–that brought home what a loss higher education suffers at his passing.

Randolph Bromery, 1926-2013