Epps was unafraid to be an outspoken advocate of his policy stances, often throwing his weight behind projects opposed by Lewis and publicly disagreeing with his boss about the nature and aim of Harvard’s undergraduate education. He prided himself on independent thought.

At the memorial service, Gomes said that Epps offered “wise—and often unsolicited—counsel to at least three presidents and countless deans.”

“I come out of the tradition of the solitary dean,” Epps had said.

And this self-image led him to pursue his own agenda.

“I was a free-ranging citizen who spoke with whomever needed to be spoken with,” Epps said in 2000.

In 1984, Epps oversaw the stripping of official College recognition from final clubs and fraternities that would not permit membership from both genders, and in 1997, he issued a report that condemned the clubs.

“To me, they still represent anti-intellectual, highly social, high-risk activities for students,” Epps said in 1995 of fraternities and sororities.

At the same time, Epps said that it was difficult “for students to meet each other” and acknowledged “a weakness in social life” that led him to push for the creation of Loker Commons. Epps in later years challenged Lewis’ opposition to the creation of a student center.

In addition to his activism in policy matters, Epps was known as someone who touched students at a personal level.

“In conversation with him he was very warm and approachable,” Eric R. Rosenbaum ’01 said of Epps while he was dean.

These two sides of his job came together in May 1995 when Sinedu Tadesse ’96 stabbed and killed her roommate, Trang Phuong Ho ’96, before committing suicide. Epps held a series of meetings with students and administrators to provide a forum for discussing the tragedy. The murder led students and personnel to question the effectiveness of Harvard’s House advising system and its counseling and support resources.

As an associate dean in 1969, Epps experienced first-hand the social upheavals on campus during the tumultuous period. When University Hall was taken over by the Students for a Democratic Society, Epps resisted the takeover and was physically carried out of the building by the students.

Gomes said at the service that Epps was completely calm—if somewhat profane in his language—when he was carried out of University Hall “as if in a sedan chair.”

“He guided the College with a steadying hand through turbulent seas and in calm waters, he nudged the administration with wisdom and vast experience, and he elicited true affection and respect from both the students and his colleagues in University Hall,” former Dean of the Faculty Jeremy R. Knowles said in a statement.

One of the most prominent black administrators at the College, Epps attempted to facilitate race relations on campus. While a teaching fellow at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies in 1964, he examined in a piece published in The Crimson how the Civil Rights Movement had reached an impasse. As an associate dean, he published in The Crimson another piece on the meaning of Malcolm X’s death.