Bobby Fong
Dean of Faculty and Professor of English (1995-2000)
Professor Sam Pellman presented a memorial minute for Bobby Fong, former Dean of Faculty of Hamilton College and Professor of English, on November 4, 2014.
Bobby Fong was born Bok Le Fong, the son of Chinese immigrants, in Oakland, California in 1950.
As a young boy he discovered baseball as a means to understand American culture, and over subsequent years he acquired an impressive collection of baseball trading cards. He attended Harvard University on a scholarship and graduated with a major in English in 1973. He then received in 1978 a Ph. D. in English Literature from UCLA, where he wrote as his dissertation a critical edition of the poetry of Oscar Wilde. He continued to be a scholar of Oscar Wilde’s writings throughout his career, including work as the co-editor of volume one of The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, published by the Oxford University Press.
Bobby’s first teaching position was at Berea College, a small private college in central Kentucky that provides education free to its students, most of whom are from southern Appalachia. After eleven years at Berea, including service as chair of the department of English, he became Dean of Arts and Humanities at Hope College, an evangelical Christian college in Michigan. Within a few years, however, he resigned from that position because he disagreed with that college’s decision not to hire a gay person as a member of the faculty.
People from Hamilton College first met Bobby on a cold, late autumn day in Philadelphia in 1994. For those of us on the search committee it seemed that the hour we spent with Bobby ended too soon. We were impressed by his calm and thoughtful responses to our questions and by the instinctive sense of fairness and compassion that seemed to frame his approach to the work of being a dean. He got the job. From 1995 through 2000 he was the Dean of the Faculty and a professor of English literature here at Hamilton College.
During his years as dean he was a passionate advocate for the improvement of science facilities at Hamilton, and this advocacy came to fruition just a few years after he left Hamilton. Bobby also oversaw an extensive review by the faculty of the college’s curriculum. He was careful not to impose his curricular vision on us, and the outcome, of course, was something that none of us could have anticipated.
Bobby struggled with depression, and during his time at Hamilton he suffered a particularly acute episode. He requested a personal leave and received treatment, which was successful in restoring him to good health. By this example but also by active counsel, he encouraged us to take care of ourselves and to do what we needed to do to maintain a healthful balance among the activities of our lives.
In 2001 Bobby became the president of Butler University, in Indianapolis. His ten years there were highly successful as that institution achieved a higher national profile. While leading fundraising campaigns, a strategic planning process, and efforts to improve student life, he also found time, during an outbreak of the flu, to star in a video about the proper way to wash one’s hands (http://youtube/uto212IOa8Y).
In 2011 Bobby was inaugurated as the 15th president of Ursinus College, in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. His work at Ursinus followed the same trajectory of success. While president at Ursinus he also served as the chair of the board of the Association of American Colleges and Universities and on the boards of several other national college organizations.
On the morning of September 8, 2014, Bobby experienced an acute cardio-vascular event and succumbed. He is deeply missed by his beloved wife, Suzanne, and his two sons, Jonathan and Nicholas (Colin). Those of us who knew Bobby miss his sense of humor and his robust laugh. We will always remember, too, his sense of fairness and compassion, his patient leadership, and his dedication to the principles of liberal education.”
