Hardheaded Boss

As the richest ($2.5 billion) philanthropic organization in the world, the Ford Foundation supports hundreds of projects and some have raised storms of controversy. Last week one autonomous subsidiary, the Fund for the Republic, was locked in battle with a congressional committee because of its wobbly approach to the problem of Communism (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS). Ignoring its offspring's noisy troubles, the foundation quietly beefed up its command, picked a new president to succeed able Lawyer H. Rowan Gaither Jr., who continues only as the foundation's board chairman. The foundation's new boss: Henry Townley Heald, president of New York University.

At 51, Henry Heald has long been known in academic circles as an unobtrusive worker of wonders. In 1937 he took over Chicago's dying (400 students) Armour Institute of Technology, merged it with the Lewis Institute, transformed the two schools into the flourishing Illinois Institute of Technology. Enrollments soared to 7,000, and the campus grew from seven acres to 85. In 1951 Heald moved to N.Y.U., the largest (37,064 students) private university in the U.S., proved that he could make even the biggest grow. He put up a new medical science building, a student center, a residence hall, a military science center, has three additional buildings under construction.

Quiet, lanky Henry Heald, a hardheaded defender of academic freedom, has consistently refused to join the furious academic fusillade aimed at congressional investigators; he declared in 1953 that "it is just as inappropriate to issue blanket condemnation of investigating committees as it is for the members of such committees to make irresponsible charges against individuals or institutions." Heald disagrees basically with the stand taken by such educators as the Fund for the Republic's Robert Hutchins, who once declared that he would not necessarily fire a Communist professor unless he were incompetent and indoctrinating his classes.

"It has been clearly demonstrated," said Heald, "that a member of the Communist Party is not a free agent, intellectually or politically. He cannot claim academic freedom because he has forsaken the principles of academic freedom."

When N.Y.U. Associate Professor of English Edwin Burgum not only refused to answer questions on his alleged party membership before a Senate subcommittee but also refused to talk to a committee of his own colleagues, Heald suspended him as "unfit to continue in a position of educational trust."

Veteran Fund Raiser Heald will preside over the distribution of funds which have totaled more than $800 million since 1950. One of his earliest and most pleasant tasks: disbursement of the $260 million bonanza, deriving from last year's sale of Ford Motor Co. stock, to all accredited private colleges and universities--including $5,000,000 to N.Y.U.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.