OHN A. GRONOUSKI,
the first dean of the LBJ School, died January 7 in Green Bay, Wisconsin, at the age of 76. A native of Wisconsin, he had lived in Green Bay since retiring from the LBJ School faculty in 1989.

Holding a long list of credentials that included a Ph.D. in economics and presidential appointments as U.S. Postmaster General and Ambassador to Poland, Gronouski came to UT Austin in 1969 to develop the new public affairs school named for President Johnson. By September 1970, he had put in place the pieces necessary to begin the master's program: a core curriculum, two policy research seminars, three faculty members (including himself and Associate Dean Alexander Clark as well as UT Government Professor Emmette Redford), two computer instructors, a small support staff, a library of 6,500 volumes, and 18 students (handpicked from a pool of more than 250 applicants). By the time he left the deanship in 1973, the student body had grown to 77, the faculty had seven full-time members, the library had more than 20,500 volumes, the School had active publications and continuing education programs, and the master's program was well established.

That Gronouski succeeded in launching the LBJ School in such a short time is not surprising in light of his record of achievements prior to 1969. Excerpts from his obituary in the New York Times tell his story well:

When he was tapped by President John F. Kennedy in the summer of 1963 to be Postmaster General, Mr. Gronouski was a highly regarded Wisconsin Tax Commissioner who had provided a crucial endorsement to Kennedy in the 1960 campaign.

Mr. Gronouski had a reputation as a militant Democrat from his role in an unsuccessful campaign to unseat Wisconsin's red-baiting Republican Senator, Joseph R. McCarthy, and as a tough-minded administrator who had revamped the Wisconsin tax system. . . .

In his first 14 months in office, Mr. Gronouski, whose candor and pipe-smoking informality endeared him to the Washington press corps, held 63 news conferences, traveled 127,000 air miles, visited 132 cities, and gave 445 speeches, an average of more than one a day, many of them to Polish-American groups.

But for all his political forays, Mr. Gronouski found time to become a highly effective postal administrator. Among other things he moved aggressively against racial discrimination in postal employment and spearheaded the transition to the five-digit ZIP code (after conceding that he did not know his own). . . .

After being named Ambassador to Poland in 1965, Mr. Gronouski continued his barnstorming ways. Operating as what amounted to President Johnson's personal envoy to Eastern Europe, he used Poland as a base for what were billed as "bridge-building" trips to other Soviet bloc countries seeking to promote trade and other ties with the United States. . . .

In 1969, several months after his ambassadorial appointment had expired, Gronouski was approached by President Johnson and by the UT Austin dean search committee as a possible candidate for the deanship of the new LBJ School. He eventually accepted the university's offer on the condition that he could "start with a clean piece of paper" and design the program according to his own vision. The rest of the story is LBJ School history. . . .

School celebrates Gronouski's vision, leadership

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