Jeremy Knowles; left impressive legacy as Harvard dean
With the self-deprecating wit he brought to many exchanges, Dr. Jeremy R. Knowles pooh-poohed any suggestion that he planned a grand entrance in 1991 as Harvard University's new dean of Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
"I'm not going to march in," he told the Globe that June after accepting the appointment to perhaps the most powerful post at Harvard, after the presidency. "The faculty is like a bus: a large, smooth-running machine. It's a bit short of gas, by the way. But the last thing I'm going to do, before getting into the driver's seat, is to change all the wheels around."
And yet the course Dr. Knowles steered until 2002 left an impressive legacy as he played a key role in first closing annual deficits, then expanding the size of the faculty and more than doubling the number of female senior professors.
He died Thursday of prostate cancer, the illness that prompted him to cut short a reprise in the office as interim dean, beginning in July 2006. Dr. Knowles, who was 72, had lived in Cambridge and had been an award-winning chemistry professor at Harvard before and after his first tenure as dean.
"Deans and leaders like Jeremy come only rarely," Neil Rudenstine, who became president of Harvard when Dr. Knowles took over as dean, said in a statement. "He had a penetrating mind. He had wit and charm and taste. Above all, he understood the nature of a university and what it meant to search for knowledge or discover even a single truth. The standard could never be too high."
The son of an Oxford professor, Dr. Knowles possessed British charm and a deft touch with the political intrigue of academia that helped smooth the choppy waters he encountered while leading the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
E. J. Corey, the 1990 Nobel laureate for chemistry who is professor emeritus at Harvard, said Dr. Knowles had been an intellectual leader in their department even before he was appointed dean.
"He was extraordinarily wise and logical and articulate," Corey said. "He was always a voice of reason, and that, coupled with his generous nature and his selflessness, made him a wonderful colleague."
His accomplishments in chemistry alone would have secured a place for Dr. Knowles in Harvard's history. Among the honors he received as a scientist were the Alfred Bader Award, the Charmian Medal, the Nakanishi Prize, and the Robert A. Welch Award.
He also was made a commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1993 in the Queen's Birthday Honours. In 2002, he was awarded the Harvard Medal to recognize his service to the university.
"Jeremy gave this university his complete devotion," Harvard president Drew Faust said in a statement. "The whole Harvard family joins in mourning the loss of a singular, irreplaceable spirit, someone who left a huge imprint on the university he loved and on countless people who will always remember his warmth, his incisive intelligence, and his passion for education."
Called in 2006 to serve as interim dean, Dr. Knowles strode into a tempest that had enveloped Harvard. Just before his return, Lawrence H. Summers resigned as president amid controversy after five years in office.
"Even though he had a very broken body he was able to give a lot," Jane Knowles said of her husband's time as interim dean. "The university meant so much to him. It was the last gift he could give Harvard, and he wanted to give it."
When a recurrence of prostate cancer prompted Dr. Knowles to step down after several months, not everyone at Harvard knew how far the illness had progressed. His wife said he nearly died a year ago.
"We feel that he's had this extra year given to him, and to us," she said. "He could feel how much loved he was and we could give him our love and appreciation, and so many people did. It was just a magical year."
Born in Rugby, England, Dr. Knowles served for two years as an officer in the Royal Air Force, which provided an early lesson in leadership; he supervised scores of enlisted men.
"I was a very young 18," he told the Crimson, Harvard's student newspaper, in 1997. "I had a funny hat on, so they saluted me, but some of the sergeants were as old as my father. That sort of builds character, although as I sat there alone in the officer's carriage, I didn't think about it building character."
From the Air Force he went to Balliol College in Oxford. He studied chemistry and received his bachelor's degree in 1959 and a master's and doctorate in 1961.
While in college he met Jane Sheldon Davis, whom he married in 1960. She recalled in the 1997 Crimson article that along with her husband's intellectual gifts, he was a great dancer and played piano. The two sang together in choruses.
Dr. Knowles taught at Oxford University and was a visiting professor at Harvard and Yale before moving to the United States in 1974 to become a tenured professor at Harvard. He was appointed the Amory Houghton professor of chemistry and biochemistry in 1979.
After he stepped down as dean in 2002, he returned to his work as a teacher and researcher and was also a member of a high-level three-person team that made crucial planning decisions about the university's new campus in Allston.
A fellow of the Royal Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Dr. Knowles conducted research that helped advance the understanding of enzymes.
"He demonstrated in a totally convincing and elegant way that over evolution, enzymes had been successively improved to the point where no further catalytic acceleration was possible . . . that they'd been tuned up to perfection," Corey said. "Scientists are skeptical and they don't like to admit to anything being perfect. But Jeremy demonstrated that you couldn't improve on that."
Perfection could be more elusive as an administrator, as Dr. Knowles acknowledged when he became dean in 1991. "I have no answers," he told the Globe, "but I have some questions."
Indeed, he said, leading Harvard might be the most daunting job around. When the university began looking for a new president several years ago, some thought Bill Clinton might be a candidate.
"I suppose if you could run the country, you could run Harvard," Dr. Knowles said dryly. "But I think the country might be easier."
In addition to his wife, Dr. Knowles leaves three sons, Sebastian of Columbus, Ohio, Julius of Weston, and Timothy of Chicago; five granddaughters; and two grandsons.
A memorial service will be announced.
Marcella Bombardieri of the Globe staff contributed to this obituary. 