Edward J. Boling, 17th president of the University of Tennessee (1970–88) was the first president of the newly organized UT system when he was elected president in 1970. Born in Sevier County in 1922, he received the bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting and statistics from UT (1948 and 1950, respectively) and the EdD from George Peabody College for Teachers in 1961. (Peabody College for Teachers became the George Peabody College of Vanderbilt University in 1979.)
During his undergraduate study at UT, he won the Phi Kappa Phi Scholarship Award (1947), and he was charter president of UT’s Beta Gamma Sigma professional fraternity chapter. He was a statistics instructor at UT from 1948 to 1950 before becoming a research statistician and later supervisor of source and fission materials accounting at Union Carbide in Oak Ridge. He left Union Carbide in 1954 to join the cabinet of Governor Frank Clement as budget director and was subsequently made commissioner of the newly created department of finance and administration. He served as UT vice president for development, 1961–68; UT vice president for development and administration, 1968–70; and president, 1970–88.
He gave the commencement address for spring 1988, at which Chancellor Reese presented him with a final tribute to the construction projects begun during his tenure—the naming of the alley behind Melrose Avenue as Boling Alley. At the June 1987 meeting of the board of trustees, Boling was appointed to a special professorship (the third such professorship established by the board), which paid $87,000—just under 80 percent of his current $109,000 salary. The professorship was to be in place until he turned age 70, at which time he was to receive a salary as president emeritus, 25 percent of his president’s salary.
He served as a director of Allied Signal Inc.; CSX Corporation; North American Phillips Corporation; United Foods Inc.; Swan Brothers Inc.; Technology for Energy Corporation; and the American College Testing Program. In 1984 he received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Richmond.
His election (in a secret, executive session of the board of trustees, by a split vote the trustees declined to make public) was unpopular with many students and faculty, and his leaving was also marked with controversy as the UT at Chattanooga Faculty Council refused to adopt a farewell resolution that praised his work.
He was married to Jane Carolyn Pierce, a 1952 UT graduate.