Geology scholar mined resources to help UT grow
Peter Flawn wrote in his 1990 book that leading the University of Texas at Austin required endless patience — and either a love for intercollegiate sports or the ability to “fake it.”
The geology scholar — who served as UT-Austin’s president twice — nevertheless called the job “perhaps the finest position to which a man or woman can aspire,” as described in “A Primer for University Presidents: Managing the Modern University.”
Flawn died overnight Sunday at the age of 91 in his West Austin home. Colleagues remembered Flawn’s deep contributions to UT-Austin and the UT System on Sunday.
Flawn, who also led University of Texas at San Antonio as president, drove forward ambitious fundraising efforts, raised the academic profile of the flagship and continued to serve the system’s universities on committees well after he stepped down as president.
“For a long time, I introduced him as the greatest living president of the University of Texas,” said Larry Faulkner, who succeeded Flawn after his second term as UT-Austin’s president. “He believed in UT Austin as a central driver of public well being.”
Born in Miami, Flawn began at UT-Austin’s Bureau of Economic Geology in 1949 after studying at Oberlin College and Yale University and working at the U.S. Geological Survey. He led the bureau and taught in UT’s geology department from 1960 through 1970.
He began his first of three stints as a college president in 1973 at UT-San Antonio, four years after the Texas Legislature and then-Gov. Preston Smith established the university. Under Flawn’s leadership, in 1975, the university’s main campus began holding classes.
He began as president of UT-Austin in 1979 and served until 1985. He advocated for additional state funding and worked to fight a “war on mediocrity” to bolster UT’s academic rigor. He attracted millions in sponsored research dollars and spearheaded the construction of new research buildings. Under his leadership UT’s faculty endowments grew to 851 from 112.
Began capital campaign
Flawn’s focus on the faculty was his “big contribution” to the flagship, said Hans Mark, UT System Chancellor from 1984 through 1992.
“He made very, very few mistakes,” Mark said. “I’m going to miss him, I will.”
When Mark began as chancellor, he said, he took Flawn’s advice to heart.
“I did what he told me,” he said. “Eventually, a year or two in, I knew what I was doing. He said, ‘You’re free.’”
Flawn returned to the university in 1997 to lead as interim president while the university searched for its next president, who would be Faulkner. During that time, Flawn started a $1 billion capital campaign, then the largest in university history. Flawn encouraged faculty to strive for worldclass work, Faulkner said.
“When he took over, this was a very good regional university, but it was not really a large player on the national scene or the global scene,” Faulkner said. “He took the steps to move Texas to the national and global stage, and the most important (piece) in that was the steps he took to strengthen the faculty.”
Answered the call
Flawn advised the system’s flagship after Faulkner took the university’s helm. His committee work included trying to woo the George W. Bush presidential library to a UT campus, an unsuccessful bid, and studying recommendations on how to change admissions policies after UT-Austin leadership was found to have intervened in admissions decisions based on financial or political considerations.
“Whenever the university sought his help — from his earliest days doing geology research in West Texas through his time as president emeritus — Peter always answered the call,” said UT-Austin President Greg Fenves, who began as an assistant professor at UT-Austin during Flawn’s presidency. “His contributions to our great university were immense and we will miss him deeply.”
Flawn and Faulkner would eat lunch at least every month together. Their last meal together was Tuesday, Faulkner said.
Flawn is preceded in death by Priscilla Pond Flawn, his wife of 70 years and an early childhood education advocate, and a daughter, Laura B. Flawn. The couple met at Oberlin College in Ohio, where she studied English and music and he studied geology.
He is survived by a second daughter, Tyrrell Flawn, and her husband, John Howe, of Washington, D.C., in addition to four grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren. Tyrrell Flawn announced her father’s death through a family spokesperson on Sunday.