Boston Banker Chosen As University Treasurer

The University yesterday appointed a prominent Boston banker as Treasurer of Harvard College, a post which also entails voting membership on the governing Corporation.

Roderick M. MacDougall '51, retiring chairman of the Bank of New England, will take over the Treasurer's position from 11 year veteran George Putnam Jr. '49 on July 1.

As Treasurer, MacDougall will oversee the performance of the Harvard Management Company (HMC), the University's in-house investment group created by Putnam in 1974, and will also act as the Corporation's prime advisor on major captial expenditures.

MacDougall, age 58, yesterday declined to comment extensively on what he hopes to achieve as treasurer, but said, "One of the things I admire most about Harvard is its ability to continue its commitment to excellence regardless of what is impacting it from the outside, and its ability to continue to adapt to changes."

University officials said the major challenges confronting the new treasurer are paying off more than $600 million in debt and overseeing the ongoing. House renovation project as it starts on the Quad Houses.

Over the last three years, Harvard has floated two major bond issues to finance building projects--$350 million for the Medical Area Total Energy Plant (MATEP) in Boston and $229 million for the House renovations and other improvement projects around the University--as well as a handful of smaller issues which make up the largest debt any university has ever owed.

Management company President Walter M. Cabot '55 said he expects there will be no considerable change under MacDougall.

"As I did with Putnam, I will look to him for advice," Cabot said, but added that MacDougall will not become involved with Harvard's investments on a day-to-day basis.

It was not clear yesterday whether MacDougall was the Corporation's first choice, as the final approval by the governing boards at a special meeting yesterday morning came only three weeks before MacDougall is due to start the job.

Members of the search committee--which included President Bok and Corporation members Andrew P. Heiskell '28, Colman M. Mockler Jr. '52 and Robert G. Stone Jr. '45--reported as late as mid-May that a decision had still not been made.

Another criteria in the treasurer search which boded well for MacDougall was that the Corporation sought a Boston area resident with enough independent wealth to insure that he could commit himself fairly heavily to the ostensibly part-time job.

MacDougall earned more than $400,000 last year, a Bank of New England director said.

Officials said they considered Putnam's major acheivement as treasurer the establishment of the Management Company, which handles the University's $2.5 billion endowment, and in giving the company leeway to act on its own.

"He put in motion something that can serve Harvard for decades," said Deputy Treasurer George W. Siguler, now on leave at the Department of Health and Human Services until March 1985. "He also didn't meddle in the day-to-day affairs."

"Many treasurers would want to get in and fiddle," Cabot said. "He never did that. I never felt I was taking a direct order."

Since its founding, HMC has generally outstripped the market, boosting the endowment by more than 10 percent in five of those 10 years, including a 42 percent growth in 1982.

Siguler also praised Putnam's effective use of bond issues to finance campus-wide improvements, and his deep commitment to Harvard.

The Boston mutual fund manager joined the Board of Overseers in 1967 and headed the treasurer search committee which, in 1973, ended up appointing him to the unpaid, part-time position.