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Taylor was born in Gibsland in Bienville Parish to Lawrence Foster Taylor (1892–1977)[3] and the former Marcia Aline Jay (1898–1993).[3][4] He graduated from Gibsland High School in 1940.[5] He then attended Louisiana Tech as a student for four semesters from 1940 to 1942. In May 1942, he enlisted in the United States Navy.[6] He completed aviation training in 1943 and was commissioned as an ensign. As a Navy pilot, he logged two thousand hours of flight time during World War II. He was sent to the Pacific theatre for two tours of duty and rose to the rank of lieutenant commander. He was honorably discharged from military service in 1946.[7][8]
Taylor started his academic career at the Baptist-affiliated Louisiana College in Pineville in Rapides Parish. There he served as an associate professor of history, dean of men (1952–1956), and dean of the college.[7][9]
Louisiana Tech presidency
In 1962, Taylor at age thirty-nine was selected as president of Louisiana Tech. He led the transformation and expanded enrollment of the institution. He developed academic programs, developed the university as a research institution, and greatly expanded its opportunities. It was founded in 1894 and known prior to 1970 as Louisiana Polytechnic Institute. Under his administration, many modern buildings were constructed to house the expanded programs and enrollment. These include the Wyly Tower, a library and administrative office complex; Caruthers Hall, the Thomas Assembly Center, the Lambright Intramural Sports Complex, the Aillet Stadium, and the J.C. Love Field. Some, such as Neilson Hall men's dormitory, have since been replaced.[6]
F. Jay Taylor was no relation to W. E. Taylor, a biology professor and partial namesake of the Carson-Taylor Science Building. The older man had served as president of the college from 1904 to 1906.[11]
F. Jay Taylor was an active, highly visible president who spoke before educational and civic groups across the state. His vice president until 1980 was Virgil Orr, a former chemical engineering professor and dean. Orr was later elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives from Lincoln and Union parishes, serving from 1988 to 1992.[12]
In 1968, Taylor hired Wiley W. Hilburn from Shreveport Times to revamp the Louisiana Tech Journalism Department and make the college newspaper, The Tech Talk, more representative of student viewpoints.[13] Taylor told Hilburn to "liberate" the college newspaper, which had previously been a non-controversial journal of mostly honor rolls and academic listings. It had failed to address issues of student concerns, such as the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, and the sexual revolution. Hilburn led the journalism department for thirty-one years and continued to write editorials, columns, and books.[14]
In 1974, Taylor hired Sonja Hogg, then a 28-year-old physical education instructor at Ruston High School, to develop the women's basketball team, which became nationally successful. The program began with a $5,000 appropriation,[13] reached the Final Four in 1979, and won the national championship in 1981. Hogg was succeeded as coach of the Lady Techsters by Leon Barmore, whom she had hired from Ruston High School.[15]
In 1981, Taylor told a civic club in Minden that Louisiana Tech was "no longer a college in the piney woods" and cited a list of accomplishments, including the enrollment at the time of one thousand graduate students.[16] In a 2003 interview with the Monroe News-Star, Taylor described his goal as having helped "to bring Louisiana Tech onto the national and international scene."[6]
Taylor announced on January 6, 1987 that he would step down from the Tech presidency effective June 30 of that year. He indicated that his decision to retire at the age of sixty-three was unrelated to any differences that he may have had with the Tech regents.[17] Taylor was succeeded as the president by his vice-president, Daniel Reneau.
Legacy and honors
In 1979, Tech established an annual award in Taylor's name for a successful faculty member engaged in undergraduate teaching duties.[18]
The F. Jay Taylor Eminent Scholar Chair of Journalism was named for him.[19]
The F. Jay Taylor Sports Forum was also named for him.[20]
Taylor's edited and annotated Reluctant Rebel: The Secret Diary of Robert Patrick, 1861–1865 (1959) is based on a diary written in Pitmanshorthand by Patrick, a private in the Confederate army. Patrick was from Clinton, near Baton Rouge. A clerk in the commissary and quartermaster departments of the Fourth Louisiana Infantry, Patrick began his diary in April 1861 and wrote until the last days of the conflict.[21] Though the diary was intended only for Patrick's personal reflections, it was handed down in the family and Taylor was offered the manuscript by Patrick's niece.
Taylor soon determined Patrick to have been a keen observer of events, both military and off-duty. Patrick was present at the 1862 Battle of Shiloh in southwestern Tennessee. He was at the sieges in 1863 of Vicksburg, Mississippi, and Port Hudson, north of Baton Rouge.[5] He participated in the retreat from the Battle of Atlanta in Georgia. There, Patrick's regiment suffered one of the highest records for casualties in the entire Confederate Army. Patrick was particularly knowledgeable about logistics and supply, and assessed the competence of his superior officers. Patrick's integrity and writing skill made his diary valuable for its portrayal of a soldier's life. Though anecdotal, the work is considered a revealing portrait of a soldier in the lower echelons of the Confederate military.[21] Taylor said that Patrick was "very loyal to the South, but he never really understood his role as a Confederate soldier."[13] In 2007, Taylor donated his Civil War artifacts, including the Robert Patrick materials, to the Tech Department of Special Collections, Manuscripts and Archives, an action which he described as "saying goodbye to an old friend."[13]
Taylor's other work is The United States and the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 (1952), with an introduction by diplomatic historian Claude G. Bowers.[22]
Taylor also read the initial manuscript for Professor John D. Winters' The Civil War in Louisiana (1963), a professor at Louisiana Tech; it was published for the state's Civil War centennial observances.[23]
Other activities
The Ropp Center on the Louisiana Tech University campus served as the president's home during the tenure of F. Jay Taylor.
Taylor served on numerous state and national boards and commissions. A nationally recognized expert in the field of labor arbitration, he was chairman of the Labor-Management Commission of Inquiry, National Academy of Arbitrators, labor panels of the American Arbitration Association, and the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service.[7]
In 1971, the University of California Alumni Association cited Taylor for "Outstanding Achievement" and honored him at the school's homecoming. In 1985, he was similarly recognized by his alma mater Tulane as an outstanding alumnus of the graduate school.[7]
Taylor served on numerous publicly traded corporate boards, including Pizza Inn, Bonanza Steakhouses, Michael's Stores, and the Illinois-Central railroad. Taylor and fellow Illinois-Central directors successfully merged the Illinois-Central with the Canadian National Railroad, thereby creating the largest railroad in the world.
Prior to the building of the current president's home near the Tech stadium, Taylor resided in a plantation-style house. This has been adapted as the Ropp Center, named for Ralph L. Ropp, Taylor's predecessor as president, who served from 1949 to 1962.
Marriage and family
Dr. F. Jay and Mrs. Evelyn Taylor with son Terry Jay Taylor and the family dogs (1967)
On April 18, 1946, Taylor wed the former Evelyn Marie Bast (born March 8, 1923), then of Milford, Michigan, and later from Cincinnati, Ohio.[8] The couple had one son, Terry Jay Taylor (born September 26, 1947).[26] At some point prior to 1982, the Taylors were divorced.[27] By 1988, Taylor had wed the former Linda Lou Kavanaugh (born July 19, 1942).[28] Evelyn later married Earl Cedric Johnston (born November 24, 1927) of Show Low in Navajo County, Arizona.
When Taylor died in Ruston at the age of eighty-seven, Daniel Reneau, current president of the university, described his predecessor as "a great leader and a great president. I was privileged to serve seven years under him as vice president. A senior statesman and point guard in the Tech family has fallen, and we will miss him greatly."[6]
Taylor's services were held on May 18, 2011 at the First Baptist Church in downtown Ruston. Interment followed at Greenwood Cemetery.[7]
Taylor was eulogized by Sidney "Sid" Moreland IV, a former president of the Louisiana Tech student body, who spoke for what he called "all the students who were fortunate enough to pursue their education under the leadership of Jay Taylor. ... He epitomized the grace, humility, vision, and the intellectual depth that only a great university deserves. He made us all believe in that greatness and the gift of his tireless work lives on in all of us who were served by him, and blessed that he was ours ..."
William Claiborne Robinson, known as W. C. Robinson, was a mathematics professor paid $800 per year who was elevated for one year, 1889 to 1900, as the second president of Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, Louisiana.
Gibsland-Coleman Complex, also known as Gibsland-Coleman High School, is a K-12 school in Gibsland, Louisiana, USA. It is a part of the Bienville Parish School Board.
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