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After being courted by faculty and trustees to take over GW in 1965, Lloyd Hartman Elliott said he would not accept the University presidency until one more group signed off: students.

Edward Gnehm, then the student body president, said that approval became easy after he met with Elliott at the Hotel Washington that year. Elliott pledged “in his quiet, calming voice,” Gnehm said, to build a stronger University spirit amid wartime tension between administrators and students.

“His vision became the University community’s vision. With patience and great perseverance, he brought people together,” said Gnehm, now professor in the international affairs school named after the former president.

Memories of Elliott’s 23-year University presidency wafted Tuesday through the Marvin Center as about 250 people gathered to pay tribute to “a gentle, yet determined soul who cared about people and about this University,” as Gnehm said.

Elliott, GW’s 14th president, died at age 94 from a brain hemorrhage Jan. 1 in D.C. He was chiefly remembered for steering the University through the turmoil from the Vietnam War protests during the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Former deans and top administrators – who helped fulfill Elliott’s efforts to ensure GW’s academic, social and financial prosperity – described the challenges and success of the man who was the longest-serving university president in the country when he stepped down in 1988.

Rod French, former vice president for academic affairs, took note of the “mosaic of reforms” instituted in Elliott’s tenure, like creating a more welcoming University for black students and female faculty.

“[Elliott] oversaw the transformation of a residential university grounded in white, southern, protestant, male-dominated culture into a truly national university,” French said.

There also were less popular reforms, French noted. Elliott’s “stubbornness” and determination to help financially flagging academic programs led him in 1967 to shut down GW’s football team, which was losing $250,000 a year.

The frugality paid off. Under a financial plan that aggressively expanded the University’s real estate investments, buildings like the Marvin Center, Smith Center and Gelman Library sprung up early in Elliott’s presidency.

Elliott – who dressed so well “he could have been confused for a banker,” French said – pushed financial success forward with fundraising charm and international travel. He helped raise GW’s endowment from $8 million to $200 million during his presidency by building donor relationships.

The commitment to diversity came from a man whose local West Virginia newspaper described him as a “Clay County farm boy” when he took on the GW presidency.

“He spoke, quietly, forcefully and effectively. His modesty was evident,” Jerome Barron, former dean of the GW Law School, said.