Claim to Fame
McCombs Hall of Fame Gains Three Eminent Texans
by Guillermo Garcia
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Donald L. Evans
Whether in the oil patch, in the business world or serving as U.S. Secretary of Commerce in his best friend’s presidential administration, Don Evans believes in and lives by the Texas Cowboys motto: “Give your best to Texas, and the best will come back to you.”
Evans says the University was a place he considered home “and where I began friendships that have lasted a lifetime. The University offered me the opportunity to succeed and the independence to fail. Fortunately, I believe I have succeeded more than I have failed.”
A native of Houston, Evans has had a long association with campus: He secured two degrees; met and courted Susan Marinis, his future wife. Later, while living and working in Midland, Texas, Evans became a donor to the schools of Law, Business, Engineering, the College of Liberal Arts, the McDonald Observatory and the athletics department; as well as serving as chairman of the Board of Regents. Evans was on the UT Board from 1995 until 2001. He was appointed chairman in 1997, a position he held for two consecutive terms.
Before joining the Bush Administration to lead the Department of Commerce in 2001, Evans served as president and CEO of Tom Brown, Incorporated, a large, independent oil and gas company. Between 1995 and 2000, Evans guided the company to a revenue increase from more than $40 million to more than $250 million.
As an undergraduate in the mid-1960s, Evans vividly recalls the anti-authority expressed by those opposed to the Vietnam War, as well as the Tower shootings, which he terms “the saddest, darkest day in the life of the University.”
“I also remember the Vietnam protests and the huge (protest) marches down Congress Avenue. I didn’t agree with those who protested, but I came away from that knowing that despite the
differences on the issues, there are many more things that unite us than divide us. It makes me proud that my years on campus remind me of our nation’s strengths, our freedoms: of speech, of expression,
of religion.”
While a student, Evans was a very popular figure on campus: he was an active member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon and the intrafraternity council; Omicron Delta Kappa and the Texas Cowboys, the honorary service organization. In 1968, Evans received the Bill McGill award for being the outstanding member of the Cowboys; in recognition of his campus and community volunteer work.
Evans received his Bachelor’s of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1969 and his MBA four years later, in 1973.
Even before he was appointed to the Board of Regents by then Gov. George W. Bush, Evans and Bush’s days together went back more than three decades. Back then, both were oil and gas wildcatters in Midland, scrambling to succeed in the rough and tumble energy business.
Evans remains one of Bush’s closest, and oldest, advisers. He helped in the campaign when Bush ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 1978. And Evans served in both of Bush’s gubernatorial campaigns and was named National Chairman of the Bush-Cheney 2000 presidential campaign.
Both Evans and his wife are on the Chancellor’s Council; members of the Littlefield Society, and life members of Texas Exes. Evans has also been involved with his local United Way, served on the board of the Scleroderma Research Foundation, and was named Jaycees Man of the Year. He was a driving force behind Native Vision, an “America’s Promise” program that provides services to more than 10,000 Native American children around the country.
He warmly remembers his campus days: “From a rich reservoir of friendships, the University has provided me many opportunities to continue to expand my professional career as well as a chance to leave the world a better place than I found it.”
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Jeffrey M. Heller
Each year, Jeff Heller hosts a dinner for bright prospective UT freshmen from the Dallas area along with their parents. Every year the event gets larger and he becomes more impressed with the quality of the students and worries about how to get more of them to Austin.
“I’ve lately done a lot of head scratching, trying to figure out how to get these bright, talented kids to Austin,” Heller says in an understated fashion.
He undertakes this important work as a form of pay back to UT.
“I have long felt a sense of connection to UT, both to the people and the history of the place. It is an important part of my life. The University gave me a lot more than I can ever give back, but now that I am in a position to, I want to give back as much as I can.”
He was offered a scholarship to join the UT swim team out of Tyler High School, where he was an All-American swimmer. “My idea was to go to the big city, focus on athletics, and maybe have some fun,” he says with a laugh.
The Vietnam War interrupted his college career, but he returned older and wiser, after serving as a commissioned officer and pilot in the Marines. Also adding a more sober tone to his campus experience the second time around, the UT Tower shootings had just occurred when he returned. He secured a BBA in Finance in 1968.
It wasn’t until many years later, as the president and COO of one of the nation’s largest and best-known information technology services firms, that he was able to understand just how far his business degree would propel him and how valuable that business school education would prove to be. He wants others to have a chance to succeed like he did.
“I didn’t realize then how grateful I would be,” he says. “How much I was to draw from my university days that would benefit me in my business career.”
When Heller joined EDS soon after graduating, the brand new company was just a small start up. “There must have been between 50 and 70 employees and we had sales of about $7.5 million,” he says of his first year at EDS.
When Heller retired some 34 years later, the firm had thousands of employees stretched across the globe, and sales of more than $21 billion. “It was quite a fairy tale I lived through. I guess you could say the firm and I grew up a bit since then,” he says with the trace of a drawl that belies his East Texas roots.
Heller still maintains a strict exercise regimen, rising three times a week before dawn to swim 2000 yards. And he still is actively involved with the educational institution he cherishes: He is a life member of the Longhorn Athletic Foundation; past chairman of the Engineering Foundation Advisory Council; a member of the executive committee of the Chancellor’s Council; a member of the Men’s Athletic Council; and a trustee of the Southwestern Medical Foundation in Dallas.
He and his wife, Carol, who graduated with a BBA in 1962, have endowed four swimming scholarships as well as the Heller Excellence In Engineering Fund.
“I feel fortunate that I am able to give back to this great university that made such a difference in my life.”
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Linnet F. Deily
Growing up in rural Texas in post-World War II, girls of Linnet Deily’s generation had a defined dream that seldom strayed beyond marriage and a baby carriage. But the current U.S. Ambassador to the World Trade Organization, former member of the UT Board of Regents, and recognized banking and brokerage executive early in life had a love of history, travel and reading that would carry her far in what was then considered by many a man’s domain.
Deily was born on a 250-acre farm in rural Collin County, just north of Dallas. The Frazier family homestead, called Heritage Farm, was where her schoolteacher parents, Harold and Ruth Frazier, grew wheat, corn, and cotton, on land that has been in the family’s possession since 1857.
Coming to the University in the mid-1960s, during the height of the counter-cultural revolution, Deily vividly recalls experiences vastly different from her years in rural farm country. “There was an amazing diversity on campus—different nationalities, religions, political views, cultures and perspectives. The exposure to new thoughts and ideas was very exciting,” she recalls four decades later.
Long before Deily received a Bachelor of Arts in Government in 1967 from UT-Austin and a Master of Arts in International Management from UT-Dallas in 1976, she was convinced that she would be involved in the international sphere. “I used to enjoy just walking across campus and observing all the differences,” said the government major whose courses focused almost exclusively on
international topics. She also minored in International Studies, an inter-disciplinary program.
As a government major, she recalls professors “who inspired us to dig in and really learn and think.” Among her fellow government majors was Lynda Bird Johnson, and Deily remembers sharing a class (with Johnson) on The American Presidency. “I can remember thinking how difficult it must be to hear your own father discussed in class.”
Not surprisingly, the future ambassador and businesswoman also became involved with the Model United Nations. “I sometimes now tell people that I prepared 35 years ago for the role I now have, but then did something else for the intervening 35 years!”
That “something else” involved serving as Chairman, President and CEO of First Interstate Bank of Texas and managing all of the retail business of First Interstate Bancorp throughout their eleven state network. At Schwab she first led the investment management business of the firm; later was named President of Schwab Retail, responsible for all the Schwab branches, call centers, and Internet trading; and finally served as Vice Chairman of the firm.
Deily was appointed by then-Gov. George Bush to a six-year term on the Board of Regents in 1995. When her bank was acquired in 1996, she resigned to take a key management role with Charles Schwab Corp. in San Francisco.
She notes that when returning to campus, whether as a Regent or on recruiting trips or for speaking engagements, “I recall some of my fondest memories. I have been fortunate in many of my life experiences, and my time at UT was among the best—coming back to campus reminds me of those good times. I’ve come back regularly for football games, and singing ‘The Eyes of Texas’ is always good for the spirit.”
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