'Doing it my way'

City renames BU street to honor Silber

The irascible rule-breaking Texan tugged at a table-sized blue sheet and revealed the green street sign that was hidden beneath.

"It's so fitting that it's John R. Silber Way," Mayor Thomas M. Menino said. "Was there any other way?"

The crowd of mostly gray-haired politicians and academics laughed. They knew. Most of them had at one time or another butted heads with the former Boston University president, who loved to skewer welfare, feminism, bilingual education, and anything else he considered a liberal piety.

And Silber himself? What did he make of the word play?

The 81-year-old avatar of academic standards, who salts his speeches with snippets of Socrates and Shakespeare, frowned.

"It's a joke that's so obvious you could smell it coming before it got here," he said coolly, eyes flashing behind tortoiseshell frames, in an interview after the ceremony. "Sure it's Silber Way. Hell, that's the way it always was when [I] was around."

Indeed.

As university president from 1971 to 1996, Silber made enemies and allies as he built BU's national reputation. As city officials renamed Sherborn Street, off Commonwealth Avenue on the BU campus, for Silber yesterday, they recalled his complex legacy of tempests and triumph. The brief ceremony was a bittersweet send-off for a man whose name still provokes strong reactions on campus.

"He is a man of very strong convictions," said Hans Estin, who was chairman of the university board from 1969 to 1976. "When he believes in something, he says it. And sometimes he hurts people."

At the same time, Estin said, "he brought in excellent people, he raised a lot of money, and he just put the school on the map."

James Brann, who was chairman of the journalism department in the late 1970s, recalled how veteran faculty members fought Silber's push to hire new professors, fearful they would lose their jobs. But Brann said BU was better for all the talent Silber hired, including Nobel laureates Elie Wiesel, Derek Walcott, and Saul Bellow.

"He's a great man who did great things," Brann said. "However, he did have an unusual ability to tick people off unnecessarily."

BU's president, Robert A. Brown, whose conciliatory style contrasts with Silber's penchant for confrontation, offered nothing but praise for his predecessor.

"Few people have made more of an impact on an institution than John has had on Boston University," Brown told the 50 or so attendees on Silber Way, outside the John and Kathryn Silber Administrative Center. "He led the transformation of this school from a large, sprawling local institution into a major, international research university."

Silber also came within 77,000 votes of becoming governor of Massachusetts in 1990. Voters, fed up with Beacon Hill lawmakers, liked Silber's no-holds-barred style. But he made so many impolitic remarks they became known as "Silber Shockers." William F. Weld won the race, and later appointed Silber to the state Board of Education.

Silber alluded to his reputation yesterday, telling Menino, "If you need any help, and I can help, I'll be there," and then adding, "if I can help you by denouncing you, I'll do that, too."

Now semiretired, Silber published a book last year, "Architecture of the Absurd," critiquing the works of architects such as Frank Gehry and Daniel Libeskind.

"The more I've seen of John Silber over the years, the more I think he's a great American," Weld said yesterday in a phone interview.

Weld called the christening of Silber Way a splendid idea. "He's a Renaissance man, and there's a touch of the 17th and . . . 18th and . . . 19th century in him, which is a high compliment."

It was not clear yesterday where the former Sherborn Street got its original name, but an official at the Massachusetts Historical Society said the city created the street Oct. 20, 1894.

At the ceremony yesterday, Silber said he was proud that Menino named the street in his honor, to recognize that "we did try to make a contribution to the city, because we knew how important the city was to the university."

"They're doing it my way," Silber said. "It's just like that song that Sinatra sings."

Michael Levenson can be reached at mlevenson@globe.com.