Much like now, many universities were looking for leaders. Positions were also open at Boston University, MIT, Brandeis University, Suffolk University and Columbia University.

During this time of revolt, serving as president of a university that stood for authority and tradition was a daunting task. When informed that he was a possible candidate, Carl Keyson, head of Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study, said, "I'm crazy, but I'm not that crazy."

Many felt that Harvard needed a strong, outspoken leader, someone qualified, flexible, innovative and maybe even brash--someone who represented the change universities were undergoing. The Crimson reported that the search committee's model for the new president was Kingman Brewster, 51, then president of Yale. Once a professor at Harvard Law School, Brewster was everything a president needed to be: charming, outspoken, diplomatic and committed to academics.

By November, the five committee members, after countless hours of collaboration with faculty and students, had narrowed the list to 69 candidates, half of whom came from within Harvard.

"I was horrified to see that I was one of them," Bok joked in retrospect in a recent interview. "I tried to stay as far away from [the search] as possible."

At that time, Bok, a graduate of Stanford University, had been serving as dean of Harvard Law School for two years and had set to work holding the law school together. He said that in retrospect he still had more work to complete at the law school and was not looking to moving on yet.

"I was not favorably disposed to [being president]," he says. "I wanted to complete what I was doing at the law school. It would be a great shame to give that all up."

Bok prominently figured in speculation about the search throughout the fall. In the Dec. 2, 1970 issue of The Crimson, Bok's picture even appeared in the "Clip and Save" section of wallet-size photos of would-be celebrities, right next to a picture of Ali McGraw from Love Story.