Rice University Provost's Office Records: Provost Frank E. Vandiver Acting Provost Joseph Cooper

Dr. Frank E. Vandiver, Harris Masterson, Jr., Professor of History, was appointed Rice University Provost in 1970. He served until 1980. The vice-presidential title was added in 1975.

Dr. Vandiver, one of the nation’s foremost military historians, received a Master of Arts Degree from the University of Texas in 1949, and his Ph.D. from Tulane University in 1951. He was awarded a Master of Arts Degree from the University of Oxford in 1963.

Dr. Vandiver came to Rice University in 1955. He served as Rice University’s acting president between 1969 and 1970, the year he was appointed Provost. He also served as Chairman of the History Department. In 1972 he started a six-year term on the National Council on the Humanities, the policy-making arm of the National Endowment for the Humanities. In January 1973, the Secretary of the Army appointed Dr. Vandiver to a five-year term as chairman of the United States Army Military History Research Collection Advisory Committee, which oversees one of the nation’s most important military history collection efforts. In 1969 Dr. Vandiver also served on the Department of the Army Historical Advisory Committee and in 1971, he was named to the Fort Leavenworth Hall of Fame Selection Committee. He taught Civil War History for two years at Oxford in England. He also served as Visiting Professor of Military History at the United States Military Academy at West Point, 1973-1974.

While Dr. Vandiver was at West Point (1973-74), Dr. Joseph Cooper, Professor of Political Science, was appointed acting provost by President Hackerman. He became a member of the Rice faculty in 1967. He was a graduate of Harvard where he received his Master’s and Ph.D. degrees. He served as chairman of the Department of Political Science from 1967 to 1972 and was the founding dean of the School of Social Sciences from 1979-88. He is a specialist on the U. S. Congress and has appeared as a witness before Congressional committees on several occasions. In 1976 Dr. Cooper served as staff director of the U. S. House Commission on Administrative Review in Washington, D.C.