Francis Joseph Mullin

Francis Joseph Mullin (December 16, 1906 – February 13, 1997), also often known as F.J. Mullin or Joe Mullin, was an American academic and the seventh president of Shimer College. He was raised Catholic, but became an Episcopalian as a teenager. He was key in engineering Shimer's brief period as an Episcopal-affiliated college; the school had previously had a Baptist affiliation.

Early life and education

Mullin was born on December 16, 1906, in El Paso, Texas. He was the second son of Joseph Peter Mullin, who was the head of the International Business College in El Paso. His older brother was the historian and oil industry executive Robert N. Mullin. He was orphaned at age 14, and passed from one relative to another. While living with his aunt, he converted from the Catholicism of his father's Irish family to the Episcopal faith of the maternal Norville side of his family.

Mullin received his bachelor's degree from the University of Missouri in 1929, and went on to study at the University of Chicago, where he completed his Master of Science in 1933 and his PhD in 1936. The college at the time had extremely low levels of fundraising, due in part to its previous history as a junior college. Mullin tripled fundraising to approximately $150,000 per year, but nonetheless the college faced insolvency in the summer of 1956. By recruiting General Motors executive Nelson Dezendorf as a donor and trustee, Mullin was able to keep the college open.

In 1966, an internal struggle broke out within Shimer that subsequently became known as the "Grotesque Internecine Struggle". A group of dissident faculty, led initially by Dean David W. Weiser, complained that Mullin did not share the governance of the college sufficiently. With the support of the board, Mullin prevailed, but this led to the loss of a large number of students and faculty. Mullin tendered his resignation in 1967, and retired in August 1968.

Personal life and death Mullin married Alma Gray Hill on May 29, 1935. The couple had two sons.