James Wright Named President of Dartmouth

On April 5 when the Trustees selected the sixteenth president, they turned to historian James Wright '64A, a quintessential Dartmouth insider with three decades of College service. Search committee chair William King '63 officially announced the choice on April 6 to an Alumni Hall packed with Wright's colleagues, students, and friends.

Wright, in true academic form, began his remarks with a quotation, but in this case from an unlikely source Yogi Berra. "When you come to a forkin the road, take it." The 58-year-old history professor has reached numerous such forks while at Dartmouth. On the academic side he's been a Guggenheim Fellow and a Warren Fellow at Harvard. Wright took his first administrative post at Dartmouth when he became associate dean of faculty in 1981. He went on to become dean of the faculty, acting president, and currently serves as provost.

Quoting President William Jewett Tucker's warning that the "risks of inertia are far greater than the risks of innovation," Wright declared, "I have no interest in inertia," and went on to outline the priorities of his upcoming administration.

"We need to affirm the importance of the liberal arts in this world of change," Wright asserted. "My vision of Dartmouth is of a research community that is committed to attracting

and retaining the very best faculty and recruiting and engaging the very best students."

Wright pledged to participate in the national debate about the value of research. "Research in the academy is not a pastime that competes with teaching but a critical activity that informs the best teaching." He then stated the obvious but rarely mentioned observation: "Dartmouth is a research university in all but name, and we are not going to be deflected from our purposes."

He also reaffirmed his commitment to affirmative action and diversity, principles honed by experience. Wright, who worked as a powderman in a mine until age 21, said, "I recognize personally the power of education and the capacity of institutions like Dartmouth, at their best, to enable full opportunities and rich lives."

Provost Wright moves to the presidential suite August 1.

The provost proved theWright stuff for theWheelock Succession.