John S. Allen

John Stuart Allen (May 13, 1907 – December 27, 1982) was an American astronomer, university professor and university president. He was a native of Indiana, and pursued a career as a professor of astronomy after receiving his bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees. In 1953 Allen became the interim president of the University of Florida located in Gainesville, Florida, and subsequently became the founding president of the University of South Florida in Tampa, Florida.

Early life and education

John Allen was born in Pendleton, Indiana in 1907. His parents were Quakers, and his father was a high school teacher and principal. While he was a graduate student at Minnesota, in 1933, he met and married the former Grace Carlton, an education student.

Astronomer, professor, university founder

Allen began his teaching career as an instructor at the University of Minnesota, and later received an appointment as an assistant professor of astronomy at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, where he taught for twelve years. Miller had previously worked with Allen in the New York Department of Education. After his permanent successor, J. Wayne Reitz, assumed office in 1955, Allen continued to work as the executive vice president of the University of Florida until 1957. and the Florida Board of Control appointed Allen as the first president of what would become the new University of South Florida (USF) on June 27, 1957. and would lead the new university as its president from its inception in 1957 until his retirement in 1970.

On August 1, 1957, the newly minted university president and his secretary Ann Strickland moved into a borrowed office in the Hillsborough County Courthouse and went to work. When Allen arrived in Tampa in 1957, the fledgling university did not have a name, physical plant, faculty or students. The Florida Legislature appropriated $1.2 million in 1957 and another $5 million in 1959, and construction of the first three buildings began in earnest on of largely empty sandy brush land located north of downtown Tampa. Ten years later, when Allen retired, USF had over 14,000 undergraduate and graduate students.

Under Allen's leadership, South Florida heralded itself as the "Harvard of the South", and emphasized academics to the exclusion of major college sports. Allen became known for his opposition to major college sports programs in favor of a more academically centered university environment.

Legacy

When John Allen assumed his duties as the first president of the then-unnamed University of South Florida on August 1, 1957, the university had no students. By the beginning of the 2009–2010 academic year, over 47,000 undergraduate and graduate students were enrolled on the university's four campuses in Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota and Lakeland. During the 2008–2009 academic year, USF graduated over 10,000 undergraduate, graduate and professional students in 228 degree programs. He was survived by his wife of forty-nine years, Grace Allen; she died on December 16, 2007.