Working under a title that has changed from farm administrator to chancellor, these strong leaders have included farmers, librarians, teachers, scientists, lawyers, historians—even a professional baseball player.
Kumble R. Subbaswamy
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
2012–2023
Under Kumble R. Subbaswamy’s leadership, the flagship campus became one of the fastest rising top-tier public research universities in the country. His pursuit of academic excellence; promotion of research and outreach; and initiatives aimed at addressing campus climate, diversity, and culture positioned him as a highly regarded chancellor both within the campus community and nationally. A trained physicist, he is an elected fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Robert C. Holub
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
2008–2012
Robert Holub’s career has been devoted to public research universities. Most of his professional life was spent at the University of California, Berkeley, where he worked for 27 years. Prior to becoming chancellor of UMass Amherst, he served as provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Tennessee’s flagship campus in Knoxville. A prolific writer, Holub’s academic interest is in 19th- and 20th-century German intellectual, cultural, and literary history. As chancellor, he brought UMass Amherst to new heights of recognition and competitiveness, despite severe economic challenges.
Thomas W. Cole Jr.
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
2007–2008
The first president of Clark Atlanta University, a historically black, four-year liberal arts college, Thomas W. Cole Jr. was tapped to be interim chancellor of the Amherst campus. During his tenure, he was known for his quiet leadership style and for keeping the campus on track with new construction and hiring of faculty. He established Founders Day, a celebration of the history of UMass Amherst.
John Lombardi
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
2002–2007
A Latin American historian with a specialty in Venezuela, John Lombardi quickly filled the chancellor's residence with his library of 20,000 books. He coined the phrase "new dirt," his term for construction sites on campus. The charismatic leader broadened the fundraising organization for the campus, including creating the UMass Amherst Foundation.
Marcellete G. Williams
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
2001–2002
The first woman to serve as chancellor, Marcellete G. Williams had been deputy chancellor for seven and a half years. She continued to upgrade the computer system, effectively bringing campus information technology into the 21st century.
David K. Scott
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1993–2001
Born in Scotland's Orkney Islands, David K. Scott trained as a nuclear scientist. Infrastructure repairs, long neglected, were a focus of his tenure. This included network wiring across campus and the formation of the Commonwealth College.
Richard D. O'Brien
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1991–1993
Richard D. O'Brien succeeded to the chancellorship from the Provost's office, where he had served for seven years. In his tenure, he established awards in multiculturalism, and the William D. Mullins Memorial Center and Ice Rink opened.
Joseph Duffey
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1982–1991
From March 1990 until July 1991, Joseph Duffey served as both chancellor of the Amherst campus and president of the UMass-wide system. In 1986, Duffey, student volunteers, and professional staff renovated 23 stories of the University Library. The project was called "Mass Transformation."
Loren Baritz
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1982
After Koffler retired, then-Provost Loren Baritz served as chancellor for several months before Joseph Duffey's arrival. A historian, Baritz had written about the Vietnam conflict and its effects on American culture.
Henry Koffler
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1979–1982
Vienna-born scientist Henry Koffler initiated "The Year toward Civility" and formed the Chancellor's Commission on Civility in Human Relations. For the first time in many years, no new buildings were added on campus. Degrees conferred now numbered 5,346.
Randolph W. Bromery
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1971–1979
The university became more diverse under Randolph W. Bromery's leadership as he was the first Black man to take the post. He hired numerous faculty of color and secured a home for the archives of W. E. B. Du Bois and Horace Mann Bond, making the university library a leading repository for African American thought.
Oswald Tippo
Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1970–1971
The first chancellor of UMass Amherst, Oswald Tippo '32, '54Hon, was a botanist. Under his tutelage, classes in Asian American and African American studies were initiated. Namesake of the Oswald Tippo Library Courtyard and Sculpture Garden, Tippo taught at UMass until 1984.
John W. Lederle
President, University of Massachusetts
1960–1970
Leading the charge for UMass Amherst to become a nationally respected research university, John W. Lederle played a large role in shaping the campus as it looks today, adding 45 new buildings. Under Lederle, student enrollment tripled to 18,378; faculty salaries nearly doubled; and the instructional budget grew by 700 percent, to more than $100 million.
Jean P. Mather
President, University of Massachusetts
1954–1960
Appointed acting president when President Van Meter became ill, John Paul Mather became, at age 39, the youngest president of his generation to lead a land-grant university. He ushered in a construction boom, adding more than 40 new buildings during his tenure.
Ralph Van Meter
President, University of Massachusetts
1947–1954
Ralph Van Meter's tenure was the period of greatest growth. Twenty new buildings were added to campus, as well as new schools of business administration and engineering. "Tall, straight, and broad of shoulder," people judged that "leadership came naturally to this imposing figure."
Hugh P. Baker
President, Massachusetts State College
1932–1946
A forester by training, Hugh P. Baker is best known for his building programs—five dormitories, Goodell Library, and others—and a near doubling of the student enrollment to 2,407 in 1947, with 324 degrees granted.
Roscoe W. Thatcher
President, Massachusetts State College
1927–1932
During his tenure, the Ohio-born Roscoe W. Thatcher expanded the farm program into the Stockbridge School of Agriculture, but resisted student-led demands for the granting of an arts degree.
Edward M. Lewis
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1924–1927
Upon graduation from Williams College, Wales-born Edward M. Lewis played professional baseball, including four years for the Boston Nationals (now the Atlanta Braves) and one for the Boston Americans (now the Red Sox). At Massachusetts Agricultural College, he joined the English faculty, served as dean, and then president. Proving too liberal for the trustees, he resigned.
Kenyon L. Butterfield
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1906–1924
Raised on a Michigan farm, Kenyon L. Butterfield was 38 years old when he became the Massachusetts Agricultural College's leader. His tenure divides into two halves: pre- and post-WWI. He resigned in 1924, saying, "I was driven out of this whole business of State House control."
William P. Brooks
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1905–1906
An 1875 graduate of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, William P. Brooks spent several years in Japan where he helped establish the Sapporo Agricultural School. William S. Clark, a former president of Massachusetts Agricultural College and teacher to Brooks, was invited to Japan to begin the school. In honor of Brooks’ work, the Japanese government bestowed on him the Fourth Order of Merit, the Cordon of the Rising Sun, and a degree of Doctor of Agriculture.
Henry H. Goodell
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1883 and 1886–1905
Born in Constantinople and an Amherst College graduate, Henry H. Goodell joined the faculty of the Massachusetts Agricultural College in its first year, 1867, teaching modern languages and English literature. He was also the first college librarian. The longest-serving president, he brought many changes to the campus and the curriculum. Among them were the admission of women in 1892, the first PhD program (entomology in 1902), and building of the campus pond.
James C. Greenough
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1883–1886
A Williams College graduate, James C. Greenough had extensive teaching experience before coming to Massachusetts Agricultural College as president. During his tenure, students numbered 108, faculty 12, and in-state tuition was $36. Old Chapel, South College, and West Experiment Station were added during his tenure, all in 1885. In 1886, after his presidency, he returned to the principalship at Westfield Normal School.
Levi Stockbridge
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1879 and 1880–1882
Hadley farmer, founding father, first employee (farm superintendent), and professor of agriculture, Levi Stockbridge had two main ambitions in life: agriculture and founding the Massachusetts Agricultural College. His brief presidency was less successful than his teaching. Revered by students, he often lent money to them and the college during hard times.
Charles L. Flint
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1879–1880
Upon President Clark's resignation and in the middle of a budget crisis (a not uncommon occurrence in the early days of the college), Charles L. Flint, one of the school's founders, agreed to serve without a salary. In 1880, there were 93 students and seven degrees awarded.
William S. Clark
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1867–1879
An Amherst College graduate, Civil War veteran, and teacher of botany and horticulture at the fledgling Massachusetts Agricultural College (MAC), Colonel William Smith Clark served the college well during difficult times. He is best known as one of the founders of Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan, where in the course of an eight-month leave of absence from MAC, he introduced American plant species and, in turn, brought many Japanese specimens here. His parting words to students, "Boys, be ambitious," make him famous in Japan still.
Paul Chadbourne
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1867 and 1882–1883
Because of poor pulmonary health, President Paul Chadbourne resigned before the first class was admitted in 1867. When offered the Massachusetts Agricultural College presidency again in 1882, 15 years after his first term, he at first hesitated, saying he "could not afford it," a reference to his poor head for business and losses in a number of ventures. He finally accepted the post, but died only a year later.
Henry F. French
President, Massachusetts Agricultural College
1864–1866
When his plans for the new college were rejected, the New Hampshire-born lawyer and casual farmer Henry F. French resigned. His better-known son, Daniel Chester French, sculptor of the Minuteman statue in Concord and the seated Lincoln in Washington, D.C., worked on the college farm as a teen.