March 30--Steven B. Sample, the former president of USC who oversaw a dramatic rise in the university's academic and financial profile during nearly two decades at the helm, died Tuesday at 75.
In announcing Sample's death, current USC President C. L. Max Nikias credited his predecessor as a skilled leader and a personal mentor whose legacy is one of transformation.
"So many of USC's successes, so much of our university's current stature can be traced back to Dr. Sample's dynamic leadership, keen foresight, and extraordinary prudence," Nikias said in a statement.
Sample served as the University of Southern California's 10th president, beginning his tenure in 1991. An electrical engineer by training, he had previously headed the State University of New York at Buffalo before assuming USC's top post. He retired in 2010 at the age of 69 but remained active at the university, serving on the board of trustees.
Under his stewardship, USC rose from 51st to 26th in U.S. News World Report's rankings of U.S. universities, and the number of its freshman applicants tripled. The university also became more selective, with acceptance rates dropping from 70% to 24%.
In his quest to build the university's stature, Sample help founded a consortium of Pacific Rim colleges and universities, and he led efforts to give USC a global presence. Record numbers of foreign students, particularly students from Asia, flocked to the university, a trend that has continued under Nikias.
When he announced his retirement in 2009, Sample told The Times that he was proudest of boosting the academic quality of the students -- achieved partly by trimming the size of the freshman class by 25% -- and enhancing the undergraduate course offerings.
Sample invented several devices and held patents in his name, including those for the controls and touch pads used in microwave ovens, but he became known as a tireless fundraiser with a gift for salesmanship.
USC received five gifts of at least $100 million during his tenure, and the university's endowment grew from $450 million to a pre-recession height of $4 billion. Battered by the recession, the endowment dipped to about $3 billion when Sample announced he was stepping down.
Recognizing the school's transformation, Time magazine named USC its college of the year for 2000. Sample told the Chronicle of Higher Education that he had the article reprinted 600,000 times.
"Every living Trojan got at least two copies," he joked. "Every dead Trojan got at least one."
Soon after Sample took USC's top job, the L.A. riots erupted in 1992. The uproar did not reach the University Park campus, but Sample understood the fear it instilled among students. The riots were later invoked to put pressure on Sample to relocate the campus outside of South Los Angeles, he said.
Joe Hellige, a psychology professor at the time of the riots and later the vice provost of academic affairs from 1998 until 2005, said Sample remained on campus during the riots although other administrators and staff were encouraged to stay away. He ate in dining halls with students, keeping a visible presence amid the nearby mayhem.
"Most of us found that to be the mark of a genuine leader," said Hellige, now the executive vice president and provost at Loyola Marymount University. "He understood the importance of the university to the city of Los Angeles but also the importance of Los Angeles as a place."
After the riots subsided, Sample sought to improve USC's relationship with the neighborhood. Campus security officers soon patrolled not just USC grounds but the community around the school, and thousands of undergraduates began volunteering around South L.A.
The Rev. Cecil "Chip" Murray, the former pastor of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church and a noted civic leader in South L.A., told The Times that Sample should be praised for diversifying the student body and establishing the Office of Religious Life.
Murray said that Sample made sure USC was a good neighbor by expanding in a way that would not strip low-income black and Latino residents of their property.
"He was a leader and he led by example of inclusion," Murray said. "As a person who came along at a time of racial discrimination and the struggle for equity on the part of minorities, he was a 'we' person and not 'we who are in the majority.'"
About a decade into his tenure, Sample was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. In a letter informing the university's faculty of the diagnosis in 2001, he said the condition had given him a tremor in his left hand, but he did not expect it to spell the end of his career.
"I have no intention of letting Parkinson's stand in the way," he stated in the letter.
The faculty expressed gratitude for his "forthright acknowledgment" of the diagnosis, passing a resolution in the faculty senate in a show of confidence for his continued work.
He kept true to his word, serving nine more years as president. Only Rufus B. von KleinSmid, who served as USC's president from 1921 to 1947, had longer in the position. When he announced his retirement, Sample said the university needed "fresh leadership."
"I think I'm still pretty high-energy compared to most university presidents," he told The Times. "But I think a new president might bring a lot more energy, and that would be great."
Steven Browning Sample was born in St. Louis, Mo., on Nov. 29, 1940.
Sample married his college sweetheart, Kathryn Brunkow, while both were completing undergraduate studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
He remained at the University of Illinois, earning a master's and doctorate degrees in electrical engineering.
Before assuming the presidency at SUNY Buffalo, he taught at Purdue University, the University of Illinois and the University of Nebraska.
He is survived by his wife, Kathryn Brunkow Sample; two daughters, Michelle Sample Smith and Elizabeth Sample; and two grandchildren.
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Times staff writer Zahira Torres contributed to this report.
