University of Virginia Library

Swarthmore President Cross Named
To Become New Dean Of Faculty

Robert D. Cross, president of
Swarthmore College, will assume the post
of Dean of the Faculty of Arts and
Sciences July 1, the Board of Visitors
announced yesterday.

Elected to the faculty as professor of
history, Mr. Cross will function as the
chief advisor to Vice President and
Provost David A. Shannon on courses of
study in graduate and undergraduate arts
and sciences.

Since 1969, Mr. Cross has served as
president of the 1,200-student liberal arts
college in Swarthmore, Pa. He was
president of Hunter College, City

University of New York, from 1967 to
1969 and was chairman of the
department of history at Columbia
University from 1964 to 1967.

"We are fortunate to have Mr. Cross
join the University staff," Vice President
Shannon said yesterday. "He is a scholar
and teacher of demonstrated great
ability."

An extensive writer in the field of
American history, Mr. Cross received his
bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees
from Harvard University. He is a native of
Grinnell, Iowa.

Social Science Editor

He served as editor of the Columbia
Studies in Social Science from 1961 to
1967 and was a contributing editor of
Immigration Digest from 1960 to 1967.
He has been a member of the Commission
on Tests of the College Entrance
Examination Board.

Mr. Cross has also served on the board
of trustees of The Professional Children's
School in New York, the community
advisory board of the Metropolitan
Hospital and the Board of Trustees of the
Dalton School in New York.

Written Articles

The author of "The Church and the
City" and "The Emergence of Liberal
Catholicism in America", he has also
written a number of articles in such
publications as the Yale Review, the
American Catholic Historical Review and
the Atlantic Monthly.

Mr. Cross succeeds W. Dexter
Whitehead as dean of the faculty. Mr.
Whitehead will continue to hold the
positions of Dean of the Graduate School
of Arts and Sciences and Director of
the Center for Advanced Studies.

The Board also announced the
appointment of five new department
chairmen. The new chairmen include
Kevin M. McCrimmon, mathematics;
William W. Abbott, history; H. Grant
Goodell, environmental sciences; Michael
H. Prosser, speech and drama, and
Richard T. Selden, economics.