From Amex to Academe

Businessmen today readily recognize that a good university executive may have the makings of a topflight corporation officer--and universities likewise know that a learned business leader may be just the man to head up a college. Fifteen years ago, when the New York Stock Exchange was searching for a new face to give some depth to its public image, it chose as president George Keith Funston, then head of Trinity College. Last week the pendulum swung the other way when Connecticut's Wesleyan University announced that its new president will be Edwin Deacon Etherington, 41, president of the American Stock Exchange.

At 6 ft. 2 in., a trim 190 Ibs., Ted Etherington looks like central casting's image of a dynamic businessman. Son of a New York public accountant, he graduated from Wesleyan in 1948, taught English there for a year, then went on to Yale Law School. Etherington served for a year as clerk to a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals, later went to work for a Wall Street law firm that specialized in investment problems. Eventually he moved on to serve as secretary and vice president of the Big Board under Funston. He was named head of Amex in 1962.

At Wesleyan, Etherington will take home much less than the $100,000 a year that he earns at Amex, but is so little worried about the loss of income that he hasn't even talked salary with the school's trustees. With an endowment exceeding $150 million, Wesleyan clearly picked Etherington for his executive rather than financial abilities, although, notes Trustee President Gilbert Clee, "No college seeking to be dynamic will ever have too much money."

Etherington's acceptance of the Wesleyan presidency came as a surprise to Wall Street, which considered him the man most likely to succeed Funston, who is expected to retire from the Big Board in the fall. Etherington, however, says that he has always been interested in education, and sees no radical discontinuity between investment and learning. He left law practice to join the exchange in the firm belief that its "whole raison d'etre is public service.'' Education, he adds, is simply the highest type of service.

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