Lawrence Hyde interview

              1
Transcript of oral history interview conducted with
Lawrence Hyde on February 18, 2009 for
The American University in Cairo University Archives
[00:00:00]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
This is an oral history interview for the American University in Cairo's University
Archives. The interviewer is Stephen Urgola and the interviewee is Mr. Lawrence Hyde. We
are in the Karnak office in Garden City. And the date is February 18, 2009. Could you please
give your full name and date and place of birth?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
OK. My full name is Lawrence H. Hyde. Date of birth was July 10, 1924, which is 85
years ago. So, I came to Egypt as an officer of the Jeep cooperation in America because we
wanted to sell American Jeeps to replace the Russian four-wheel drive vehicles that were in
the Egyptian army in 1974, when President Sadat switched his alliance, which had been with
Russia, to an alliance relying on the United States.
[00:01:25]
It was obvious that we wanted to put American vehicles into the army, and I worked from
1974 to 1980 selling those jeeps and, at the request of the Egyptian government, building a
factory to assemble them in Egypt, which factory out near the airport is still operating,
building jeeps and also assembling Peugeot vehicles. In working with the Egyptian
government and the Egyptian Army, I needed the help with the Arabic language.
[00:02:16]
So, a very outstanding man, who was on the Board of Trustees of the American University,
Bayly Winder, who was the leading Arabic-language expert in the academia of the United
States. He was — had been with Princeton and was then with the New York University. He
said, "You should go to AUC to hire professors who are bilingual, who can help you in your
discussions with the government." Which I did, and got to know several professors on the
staff of AUC at that time.
[00:03:09]
After some six years of working with them I had got to know something about the University,
and it was suggested that I might like to become a trustee. I said I would be very interested to
working with them and Bayly — Professor Winder took me to meet the then Chairman of the
Board of Trustees in New York and he agreed that I should become a trustee, which happened
in 1980. So that's what? Twenty-nine years ago now. And, the question is: What did I find
when I got here? 
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[00:04:03]
I found some amazing things. First of all 77 percent of the number of students at AUC, which
were small then, I can't remember whether it was 2,000 or 3,000, but it was a low number,
and 77 percent of them were girls. And then when I talked to some of the students, whom I
like to talk to: "What are you concentrating in, what are you specializing in?" And
overwhelmingly they were in mass communications. And of course my obvious question was,
what is mass communications? I had gone to Harvard University in America and graduated
from there, later from the Harvard Business School, but I had never heard of mass
communications.
[00:05:08]
It's hard to view the complete answer that I received from them because I discovered that
most of them were here to find a husband and not necessarily to get a higher level university
education. And that was a challenge then for the trustees. And, uh, the uh-- and then a big
change took place in the administration of the University. First, we had a new Chairman of the
Board, uh, and now I'm going to find that my memory is a little slipped, and you will have his
name. Uh, oh, I can't come up with it right now.
[00:06:06]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Charles Hedlund?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Charles Hedlund. Very good, thank you. You helped me with that.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And he's the one you met with to join the Board?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Please?
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
He is the—
[00:06:14]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
No. I was put on the Board by his predecessor, uh, oh God, what was his-- he was a
New York banker and not a very active chairman of the board [Landon K. Thorne]. Hedlund
became a very active chairman and started to recruit a bunch of new trustees, many of whom
are still around here such as Paul Hannon, who was actually on the Board when I joined and,
during the '80s, we got mostly in America. It didn't become an international board until the
'90s, but in the '80s we got some very good Americans on the Board who were businessmen
and lawyers and academics from America, who took a very active role in revitalizing and
turning the curriculum around. At the same time, uh, we had a new president, and once again,
you help me with his name? 
3
[00:07:31]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
So, President Pedersen?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Pedersen. Exactly. Yes, who showed great energy and courage in raising the number,
the price of tuition, and going out and recruiting additional students.
[00:07:55]
He soon realized, as did the trustees, that in order to attract more young men or boys here we
had to have a different curriculum, and with Pedersen's guiding and the support of the
trustees we added many more courses in engineering in particular — made it a strong
engineering department — and added many more courses in finance and business, attracting
once again many additional boys. And they also appointed many new professors here who
were much more uh, stringent, hard-nosed, about making sure that the young men and the
young women, who were still coming of course, had to do good work to get good grades.
[00:09:04]
It wasn't just waiting to find the husbands. And so during the 1980s was the second birth, if I
could use the word, of the American University. New courses were added, the new professors
were added, and there was a great reaching out to attract more students. And, the, certainly
during — you'd have the numbers at your disposal — but certainly during the '80s, the
number of students here increased dramatically. And the ratio, it took a long time but it came
down to where,
[00:09:54]
By the end of the '80s, it was close to the 50/50 divide between young men and young women
that we enjoy now. Uh, and Pedersen rounded, much to the dismay, if you will, of some of the
old hands here who thought he was insisting on too many changes, intended to revitalize the
curriculum and the standing of the University as a university, meaning as an academic higher
education institution. And he was so successful at it that during the '80s we actually ran the
University at a profit, which was unheard of before that, because we had been, prior to that
time, dependent heavily on subsidies from the U.S. government.
[00:11:04]
Which he felt that eventually we would have to wean, wean ourselves away from that,
because you could not expect the U.S. government to keep supporting us forever. So that was
the dramatic changes that occurred during the 1980s. And, as I said, provided the foundation
for what we have now. Now, we've gone far beyond the changes that were instituted in the
'80s, up to the real academic, strongly academic, institution, that we have now. But the basis
for that was laid during the 1980s.
[00:11:55]
It was an exciting time to be a trustee and we were expect-- all of us were expected to
contribute, not just in our specialty. In my case, I was made Chairman of the Finance
Committee, and which had been rather weak-- weakly led up until that time. But then we had
a great help from a man who is still with us, Andrew Snaith, who turned out to be an 
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extraordinarily good financial man and set up the whole scheme, if you will, of reports on
which we now rely to make sure that we could do a good budgeting job every year and could
work hard to achieve the budgets.
[00:12:58]
That, uh, uh— and then since then, I stayed on in the investment, Head of the Investment
Committee, divided it between the Finance Committee, as we now know it. It looks at the
overall income and outgo of the expenses, outgo and expenses, income in tuition and gifts and
other monies that we were able to raise. I stayed on as the Head of the Finance Committee
and that divided off a separate investment committee that I was deeply involved in.
[00:13:49]
And Paul Corddry, who is still a trustee, who was very instrumental in setting up, so that even
within my own area, going on a bit to the '90s, we found that we had been given a modest
amount due to a few million dollars from the U.S. government, with the suggestion that we
invest that in companies here in Egypt and see if we could make some money from that score
to supplement the income we had from tuition, which is vital because tuition can never, in a
well-run, growing university, could never cover the cost of the university in providing the
education, the teaching and all the support that the students require.
[00:14:54]
To this day, and that's what I'm working on here now in Karnak, those investments have
grown in size, they were up at one point over 65 million dollars. We are now spending those
income from those investments on building the new campus. But that's what they're focused
on now. But over the last, what is it, 18 years, they have contributed well over 60 million
dollars in profits to help build a new university. So that, uh— and during that— so that was
the financial structure was put in place in the '80s as a basis, and then it flourished in the '90s
because we then set about trying to raise more income and more contributions for the
endowment of the University.
[00:16:07]
Which grew during the '90s — not during the '80s, but during the '90s — to be the multihundred-million
dollar endowment we now enjoy. What else can I cite? Well, in parallel with
this strengthening of the internal controls on our income and expenses, and in parallel with
investing the money in what we call the Karnak fund, which was the private equity
investment fund that's still going on today, uh, investing that in good Egyptian companies to
make a profit, why—
[00:16:55]
In parallel with those good financial matters was the strengthening of the faculty and the
broadening, great broadening, of offerings to the students in science and engineering and in
business and in economics as well as in the liberal arts, which made many, many more
offerings to the students, far beyond mass communications, and helped build the strong
organization it is today.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And can you tell me about the president in the 1990s, Donald McDonald? 
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Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Please?
[00:17:52]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Can you tell me about the president of AUC in the 1990s, President Donald McDonald?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yes.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
His relationship with the Board?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
It, uh, never fully developed. He did, uh, uh, didn't really-- he was not a good
communicator, which is a tragedy, but it's a fact. And he didn't really interface with the Board
except in the formal meetings. The Board went on in spite of that and grew in strength and
actually took over a leading role from the President, which was not true when Pederson was
president, and is not, by far, is not true today, while Arnold, is a very — an outstanding man,
is doing the leadership here. So that, he was, what I would call an interim — he, McDonald
was an interim president.
[00:18:56]
And after a few years it was really decided that he should retire and we'd seek someone else.
Then for a period, there was, um, uh, some groping about, and we had John Gerhart, who was
a charismatic leader, a great leader, who was deeply interested in the faculty and a good
communicator with — the Board. He was, uh, uh — and he was a man who had his own ideas,
he wasn't just, really, waiting for the Board or the faculty to come up with the meetings. Now
that was in the late '70s and it was about that time that--
[00:19:58]
I remember at one meeting we were congratulating ourselves and then we had a couple
hundred million dollars in the endowment, and I raised the question: "What are we saving it
for? What are we gonna do with it?" Well, they were, we were so taken up with happiness
over the size of it we hadn't slowed down to ask that question. But quickly the Board came
together, established a Century Committee — "Where are we going? What are we trying to
do? What are we trying to build here?" And that evolved into the planning for the new
campus, which we now have. Unfortunately John Gerhart, well, in my opinion, still a young
man, was stricken with cancer.
[00:20:53]
And while we had Tim Sullivan as the interim — he was the provost, and as the — and a good
strong provost, where some of his predecessors had been lamentably weak, why, uh —, we
then had to go out and seek a new president and there was some delay in finding that. And
then we had another interim president in Mr., Professor Vandiver from Texas A&M, a good
man and, once again a challenging leader, who was not altogether comfortable with being
president, but still he was a dynamic force at pushing the organization and the abilities of the
University in academic affairs to go forward. 
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[00:21:59]
And then, after his retirement, why— went out and finally came up with President Arnold
who now is presiding over a good university as he tries to make it even better, so it can be
called a world-class university.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Can you say couple of words about President Arnold's leadership style?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yeah, alright. Oh yes I can. His leadership style is deep, repeat, deep involvement in
every aspect of the University. In other words, when he sits in on this Karnak Fund, this
private equity fund, he is on the board of — that we have just for that fund, he asks probing
questions of me. I'm running it with Marianne here and with Andrew Snaith, my two very
valuable, crucial assistants, we couldn't have done it without them.
[00:23:05]
But no, when President Arnold is on that board he has questions and pushes and wonders
why we can't do even better, and I think that typifies the style he has when he sits down with
the different departments of the different academic leaders here in looking for more
leadership and more challenging objectives for the future. And certainly, he has gone out, he
has recruited Dr. Lisa Anderson as the provost now and, boy, she certainly hit the track
running with all the suggestions she's come up with in her first year here.
[00:24:02]
But that typifies President Arnold's approach. He looks for better people, stronger people,
people who will not be satisfied with the status quo, even if it is a good status. He wants
something better for the future.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
You mentioned that the Board became more international over the years.
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yes, well, that was one of the things that started in the '90s and has really progressed
since the year 2000: get more Egyptians on the Board, which we have done and that's evident.
I mean we started to get them even in the '90s, but the strong ones that we have now like
Moataz Al Alfi and others are people that came on essentially in the year 2000 and thereafter,
and uh—.
[00:25:05]
Now we have Saudis on there, and good ones, including some very interesting females from
Saudi too. And now we have Africans, and other people interested in the Middle East,
qualified to have an interest because of their work or academic experience, and who are
contributing so that it's a real international Board, now, it's alright. The plurality may be
Americans but they're coming from more and more different countries, particularly in the
Middle East.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And can you describe some of the chairmen that you've worked with on the Board:
Charles Hedlund, Paul Hannon—
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[00:26:00]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yeah, well, well once again Hedlun— Hedlund was an experienced oil man from the
Middle East and had a good guiding hand. He would be in contrast to Arnold who believes in
digging in and, uh, uh, trying to find every way he can to make the place stronger. But he was
still a good guiding hand. And Paul Hannon was chairman for a long time and displayed, uh,
unusual competence in judging difficult situations or situations which needed some remedial
action. He was very critical of how we were spending our big monies on scholarships, because
we weren't putting them where they were needed, with the people who could not afford to go
here.
[00:27:03]
And he was one of the ones that took the lead in embracing scholarships, for, well it ended up
in the LEAD program, which I'm sure you're familiar with, but many other programs, where
just focused on Egyptian students, the ones who were good but didn't have the money or the
means to come here. I think we now have— no scholarship program can ever be perfect, but
we have one of the better ones that I am aware of in universities— here and in America.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And Frank Vandiver, you mentioned, and Boyd Hight were other chairmen of the
board in your time?
[00:27:54]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yes. Vandiver was not there— not in that job for a long time so that, uh, it's harder to
state. Even though he was good at shaking things up, he didn't know why we hadn't done this
before and he would go charging off and get it done. And Boyd Hight continues the type of,
and even strengthens, the type of chairmanship that Paul Hannon gave it, in that he looks for
people who head the individual committees — Finance, Academic Affairs, Student Affairs —
the important committees on the Board and expects these chairmen to come up with the good
basic questions, not to get involved in detail, but to come up with good probing questions on
how can we do better. A very effective leader as chairman.
[00:29:00]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And can you say something about the involvement of the Bartlett family?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Well, yeah. They were here, of course, father Tom was the president, when, in the '60s.
And he tells some great stories about what a small and struggling institution it was then and
how they were on the edge of being nationalized or something during the war in Sinai and
everything, and then now he has produced a great— well two sons who were very effective
members of the Board, and we're delighted to have them. It's not because of their family that
they are there, they're there because they're competent people and are contributing to that.
So he and his family have been, and continue to be, great contributors to the leadership of the
University. 
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[00:30:15]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
W. Kelly Simpson was another — W. Kelly Simpson? Was the Vice Chair, a while ago.
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yeah, yeah, he was, of course, a member of a very well-established and wealthy
American family who had taken an interest in the Mideast long ago. And he was a good guide
in making sure the new members on the Board, like myself when I came on, or other people,
had some idea of what the supporters, such as his family's, or his wife's family's supporter,
what— uh, what they were hoping to achieve here.
[00:31:06]
And he was a delight to be with because you could go on walking around the Karnak Temple
and he would look at a line of hieroglyphic characters and translate it into English as he read
it to you from down the scroll so, a great man, interesting man. Yes.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And you mentioned some other academics on the Board like, uh, Bayly Winder and
Lisa Anderson.
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yeah, well as I said--
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
There were some others as well?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Please?
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
There were some other academics on the Board as well?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yes, but those are the ones that, uh, Bayly Winder in particular, that had a background
on the Middle East, when it was largely an American Board, and we needed someone like that.
The other one who was a great guide to us, was, um, oh — the former Ambassador to Egypt.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Frank Wisner? Or Hermann—
[00:31:55]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Hermann Eilts! Yes. Because, he and I happened to become personal friends, because
when I came here in '74, he had just been appointed the first American ambassador to Egypt
after the long gap when there was no diplomatic relations here. And he had a mind that was
truly impressive, with his background knowledge of who the important people were in the
Middle East and what they were contributing to their individual countries and to the region
as a whole. He was one of our strong, strong members on the Board. Ever since the— yes. 
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Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Miner Crary is another.
[00:32:57]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yeah, well, Mi— Miner Crary has been here for a long time and he must be our oldest
member of the platoon of trustees now, and he was very careful at keeping the records of the
Board and made— reminding us of what our fiduciary responsibility was as board members,
yes.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And another longtime trustee was Marion Lloyd.
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Please?
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Marion Lloyd.
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
She had either ceased to be a trustee or was— ceased to be an active one by the time I
arrived, so I do not know her, yeah.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Are there any other Board members you'd like to mention, in terms of their
contribution?
[00:33:56]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Oh, yeah, there would be so many. [Stephen Urgola laughs] But those are the ones with
whom I worked the most closely in, in the [unintelligible], in the course of my time here.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Alright. Is there anything else you would like to add about AUC-- your time on the
Board with AUC?
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Oh, oh, it's been— I have to be careful with what adjectives I use. I was going to say
some of the most entertaining days of my life were coming out here. And I used to come three
times a year because of my involvement in the investments of the Foundation, the
endowment and my investments in the Karnak Fund, and that gave me a great chance, as I'm
enjoying now.
[00:34:55]
I come out for the week of board meetings and I spend another couple weeks here, obviously
working on the activities of the Karnak Fund, but also taking the opportunity to invite
professors out to dinner and to get a feeling of what's going on in the different departments
there. And I used to visit the BEC department, the British — [laughs] Business, Economics,
and Communication, with the chairman there. I was with Chairman O'Connor on this visit,
used to be with Professor Mortagy when he was chairman, and that, and that contributed to 
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something that, as you get older you kind of miss the fact that when you were young you were
in a university, you were part of it, you knew the professors, you, from a lower level, had an
idea what's going on.
[00:36:00]
But to be here and see how, if I could use the word, the management, of the university is
evolving, and you do that by talking to professors, students to some extent, but mai— in my
opinion, mainly to professors and teachers. And you learn a lot more. And you get— you're
able to formulate your own ideas as to what you should be pushing as the forward thrust of
the University.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And if I could just ask if you could say something about the change in the political and
economic climate of Egypt from when you first came in the mid '70s—
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Oh yeah well—
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And how that affected AUC.
[00:36:51]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Yeah, oh no, well it was, when I first came, Egypt was still in what I call the "straight
jacket" of the Nasser years, and too many of the people who are now leading industrialists
and big contributors to Egypt were in exile because they didn't want to come back because,
uh, the government was run on strict make-work rules and old ideas and wasn't welcoming
new ones. And I feel that while, a lot of people, including American, who— prominently
including Americans, don't understand how much President Mubarak has guided — not
implemented, but guided — the opening up of the Egyptian government to modern
management methods, and who has put into his cabinet people who really are helping Egypt
to make some of the big, big strides it's made.
[00:38:09]
When I look back to the '70s, before I was a trustee in the '80s, when I hear and realize how
tough it was to get simple decisions out of the government, and when I see now all the new
industries cropping up that are taking the place of imports and setting the basis for exports,
that's because President Mubarak has supported the idea of more competent and
independent-minded people who are committed to helping Egypt, uh, committed people who
belong on his— in his cabinet. And, it's probably the transformation that has already
occurred, from the '70s to today, hasn't been repeated in many sizable countries around the
world in such a short period of time.
[00:39:13]
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
And do you have a sense of how that affected the University's progress— the changing
economic climates? 
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Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Say that again?
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
If you could say something about how you saw these changes in Egypt as a whole
affecting AUC's progress, as a university.
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Well, it may— uh, you have to be careful because it made the changes in Egypt, the
modernization of the government and of the economic affairs of the country, has just made it
kind of a ready-made market for AUC graduates. I mean they were just learning mass
communications [unintelligible, garbled sound due to technical problem with recorder].
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
I'm sorry. I was just asking you about how the changes in Egypt's economy, how that
affected AUC as an institution.
[00:40:06]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Well, it's both an opportunity which I think is seizing, but also a challenge. In other
words, I went, as I said, to Harvard which always educated you in ways that would help you to
become a lawyer, or an academic, or a businessman or whatever you wanted to become, but it
never forgot that it had you as a student to broaden your horizons and get you interested and
contributing to whatever you want. That's our challenge. It's easy to sit back and say, "Oh all
the people in Egypt, all the businessmen or others, want to employ AUC graduates."
[00:41:03]
We have to be careful that we don't become a professional school just turning out business
graduates, but that while the students are here we broaden their mind and interest and give
them a liberal education. That's a challenge to universities throughout the world, it's too easy
to make them business schools. That's not what we're trying to do. And I think we've got a
ways to go, but I think that this, uh, modernization, if I can say it, of Egypt, is given us the
prospect that students will more and more be able to enjoy and profit from the years at AUC
far beyond whatever professional specialty they want to end up in.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Is there anything else you would like to add, anything we haven't covered?
[00:42:03]
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
Well, as I started to say at one time there, it's been entertaining and broadening of my
own horizons. I mean I have been able to look under the tent and into an academic institution
and really participate in some of the debates as to, are we doing a good job in economics? Are
we doing a good job in technology, or wherever? And how can we do better? A challenge, a
challenge, a challenge. Which keeps you young, even if you were born 85 years ago. OK?
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Thank you so much, I appreciate this. 
12
Interviewee Lawrence Hyde:
OK, alright.
Interviewer Stephen Urgola:
Thanks.
[00:42:44]
[End of interview]