In Memoriam: Willard L. Boyd
Willard “Sandy” L. Boyd of University of Iowa College of Law has died at age 95. He was a member of The American Law Institute for over 20 years.
Boyd earned a Bachelor of Science in Law and Bachelor of Laws from the University of Minnesota and Master of Law and Doctor of Judicial Science degrees from the University of Michigan. He joined the University of Iowa Law faculty in 1954, working for the University of Iowa system for more than 65 years.
Below is an excerpt of the tribute from University of Iowa:
Boyd served as UI’s 15th president from 1969 to 1981, when he left to become president of the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. After retiring from the Field, he returned to the UI as a law professor in 1996 and served as interim president in 2002–03. He formally retired from the university in 2015, though he continued to share his wisdom with any faculty member or administrator who sought him out.
The university grew exponentially during Boyd’s 12-year presidency, adding new buildings, new faculty, and new researchers and expanding its outreach to the state while increasing its national and international stature. His goal, he said, was to make the University of Iowa a premier public university so that all Iowans could access excellent opportunities in higher education.
Over the course of his tenure, undergraduate enrollment increased from 8,400 to 25,100, and he oversaw building projects that nearly doubled the size of campus. Among the more prominent buildings that opened or were planned during Boyd’s tenure:
- Hardin Library for the Health Sciences
- Lindquist Center
- Carver-Hawkeye Arena
- Bowen Science Building
- Dental Science Building
- College of Nursing
One of the biggest physical changes was the growth of University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics (UIHC), which still was focused around the original 1927 building when Boyd became president. Featuring its well-known Gothic spire, the building was undeniably beautiful but had grown so old it no longer met minimal patient needs.
Boyd and John Colloton, then UIHC’s director, knew the facility had to be improved, but to do so would be expensive and possibly controversial. Their plan cost $500,000, a significant sum in the 1970s, so the university developed a strategy to explain its goals to the Board of Regents, State of Iowa, focusing on the age of the original building.
“Antiquated,” Colloton told the Regents, driving home the point. The building was antiquated.
The Regents listened and raised thoughtful questions. They appreciated the presentation but were naturally wary of spending such a large sum. Then, at a particularly key moment, Colloton says, Boyd spoke up:
“John (Colloton) must refrain from further reference to the present 1927 vintage hospital as being antiquated because, like the hospital, I, too was born in 1927,” Boyd told the Regents.
“This was followed by hearty laughter and had the positive effect of adding a bit of levity to a serious decision-making process,” Colloton says. More important, he says, it relaxed the Regents, who went on to approve the plan that included the construction of what is now called Boyd Tower (named for Boyd in 1981) and, later in his presidency, the Roy J. Carver Pavilion.
Another of Boyd’s early tasks was helping to conceive and establish the UI Foundation (now known as the UI Center for Advancement). In 1955, Boyd was appointed by then president Virgil Hancher to study how fundraising was organized at other Big Ten universities. After extensive research and visits to other institutions, Boyd made his recommendations. The State University of Iowa Foundation was formed in 1956 with the goal of helping the university meet needs beyond those provided for by state support. The foundation raised about $28,000 (approximately $306,000 in 2022) from 1,300 contributors that first year. Both Boyd and his wife, Susan, served on the foundation’s board—Sandy from 1969 to 1981, then again from 2002–03. Susan began serving in 1982 and in 1994 was named lifetime honorary director.
Boyd’s contributions to the university also are enshrined in the Boyd Law Building, which opened in 1986, where he continued to teach after his return to campus in 1996. Yet, as Boyd was always fond of saying, people, not structures make a great university. That’s one of the witty, and often laconic, sayings that Boyd used to express his wisdom. Make your point, then stop talking—a philosophy best summed up by the title of a collection of his commencement addresses published by the UI Center for the Book: Never Too Brief.
