Bok recalls that it was the charms of Yale President Brewster--one of Bok's mentors--which finally convinced him to take the job.
Bok had first met Brewster as a third year law student at Harvard when Brewster was his professor. Told by the committee that Bok needed a little persuading, Brewster invited Bok and his wife Sissela to a dinner in New York.
From Appointment to Inaguration
For the next five and a half months until Pusey stepped down, Bok spent time in Mass. Hall learning about the various graduate schools, considering appointments for the open administrative positions and preparing for the coming change.
"I accumulated a lot of impressions on people's feelings during that time," he says.
Students called him "The Answer," "The Savior" and even "The Academy's Messiah."
And, in his 20-year tenure, Bok lived up to his names. He oversaw the Harvard-Radcliffe merger of 1977, participated in restructuring the curriculum and implemented many other changes.
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