News
WEB UPDATE -- Aug. 25, 9:49 p.m.
David T. McLaughlin, a member of the Class of 1954 who, as Dartmouth's 14th president, oversaw a campus-wide building boom and enacted fundamental changes in the Dartmouth Plan, died Wednesday morning in the wilderness of Alaska while on a fishing trip with friends and his two grown sons.
The cause of McLaughlin's death was not immediately clear, although several people close to the retired president, who was 72, said he died of natural causes.
McLaughlin suffered a heart attack during the first year of his term and had a history of heart trouble, but was not generally regarded as being in poor health.
He was president from 1981 to 1987, and was known for a corporate approach to the job that was both a source of outside praise, particularly among alumni impressed with his fundraising prowess, as well as faculty criticism.
Indeed, McLaughlin's resume read largely like a roadmap through some of the most prominent destinations in corporate America.