14 Facts About Vernon Alden

Vernon Roger Alden was an American scholar, businessman, philanthropist and the 15th president of Ohio University.

Vernon Alden received a degree in English literature at Brown University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Vernon Alden was 38 years old when he came to Ohio University from his position as the associate dean of the Harvard Business School.

Vernon Alden rerouted the flood-prone Hocking River, which annually drowned the university every spring, constructed the Appalachian Highway Network to provide easier access to Athens for visitors, and built six regional branches of Ohio University in both eastern and southern Ohio.

Vernon Alden was an advocate for the expansion of research and for new academic programs.

Vernon Alden led the development of programs such as the Ohio Fellows Program, the Cutler Program of Individualized Studies, the Honors College, and the Black Studies Institute.

In 1965, Vernon Alden was the subject of a Life Magazine feature showcasing his accomplishments as well as the challenges facing academic administrations in the wake of open admissions policies.

Vernon Alden became Chairman of the Boston Company and the Boston Safe Deposit and Trust Company in 1969.

Vernon Alden transformed the company from a somewhat local financial company into an international organization and attracted to its board of directors incredibly successful executives including the chief executive officers of Armco Steel, TransWorld Airlines, Continental Oil, Royal Dutch Shell in the United Kingdom, the Dole Company in Hawaii and Lee Iacocca, the then president of Ford.

Vernon Alden was fascinated by organizations that were hired by incredibly wealthy families like the Rockefellers and the Fords to manage their assets.

Vernon Alden recognized that similar assistance was needed by families less wealthy.

Vernon Alden took this idea and transformed it into the Financial Strategies Group, an organization created to evaluate the assets of less wealthy families, offer advice on estate planning, manage resources, and enable them to invest.

Vernon Alden became president of the Japan Society of Boston in 1969 and obtained a five-year grant from the US-Japan Friendship Commission.

Vernon Alden has been a member of the Harvard Program on US-Japan Relations, the Massachusetts-Hokkaido Sister State Committee, the Newport-Shimoda Black Ships Festival, and the Boston-Kyoto Sister City Foundation.