Two Fellows Will Retire; Faculty, Overseers Asked To Suggest Replacements

Two members of the Harvard Corporation will retire during this academic year. Nominations to fill their posts are being solicited from Faculty members, alumni, and overseers.

William L.Marbury '24 and R.Keith Kane' 22 will retire by next June, the Corporation announced. Although Corporation members can be Fellows for life, most members retire voluntarily at the age of 70. Both Kane and Marbury are 69 this year.

Over the past few years the Corporation has sent letters to members of the Board of Overseers, Faculty members, and important alumni asking for nominations. "The current letter is not much different from those sent out in the past except it is a little more formalized and is going to more people," Sargent Kennedy, secretary to the Corporation, said.

The letter says suggestions are invited from "members of the present University faculty, ... members of the present University faculty, and ex-members of the Board of Overseers, and ... several hundreds of Alumni Directors, Class Secretaries, Visiting Committee members, and the like, whose special services to Harvard... should make their counsel valuable."

The Corporation includes five members besides the President and the Treasurer, George F.Bennett '33. They are Francis H.Burr '35, a Boston lawyer, Albert L.Nickerson '33, a New York executive, and Hugh Calkins '49, a Cleveland lawyer.

Manbury, the Senior Fellow of the Corporation, was appointed in 1948. Kane became a Fellow in 1950. Kennedy expects that their positions will be filled by the beginning of the next school year.

The letter proposes the following qualifications for the nominees: "The ideal candidate should possess a readiness to entertain new ideas and the ability realistically to assess their value. He should possess a willingness to share in group decisions and the firmness to withstand irresponsible criticism; and he should be deeply devoted to the welfare of this University."

"... the Board would be particulary interested in suitable candidates between the ages of 35 and 45, but promising younger men should not be overlooked and no more than one of the members to be elected this year might usefully be in his upper fifties."

The Corporation is "the chief executive branch of the University government," according to the letter, "for they are charged with complete responsibility for the management of University finances and budgets, for the final election or appointment of all officers of instruction and administration, for the interpretation and defence of the University to other publics, and for the development of major lines of University policy."