November 8, 2002
Three Lone Stars Enter McCombs School's Hall of Fame
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- Donald L. Evans, U.S. Secretary of Commerce, made his mark as a West Texas oilman and has served as a longtime confidante of President George W. Bush.
- Linnet F. Deily, ambassador to the World Trade Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, graduated from the University of Texas at Austin to pursue a highly successful banking career, rising to become the president, CEO, and chair of First Interstate Bank of Texas.
- Jeffrey M. Heller, who came to Texas as an Olympic-caliber swimmer, went on to make his mark as COO, president, and later vice-chair of EDS, the global international technology firm founded by H. Ross Perot.
"These three individuals have made extraordinary contributions to business, community and higher education through their leadership, achievement and personal integrity. And they are great friends and supporters of the University of Texas and the McCombs School of Business," said McCombs School Dean George W. Gau.
In their acceptance speeches, all three honorees paid tribute to the transforming impact that the university had had on their lives and careers.
Secretary Evans, a former chair of The University of Texas Board of Regents, stressed his connection to the university with a mixture of sincerity and humor. "There are two things that I know for certain," said Evans at the conclusion of his speech. "One, that I can never repay the debt that I owe to the University of Texas for all of the incredible opportunities it has given me in my life. And two, that [university president] Larry Faulkner is going to try to make me."
Heller, who spoke movingly of his decision to return to the university and work with renewed focus following his service in the Vietnam War, credited his college experience with much of his success, as well as the success of EDS, the "small start-up" that hired him out of college and grew to become one of the world's technology giants. Heller ended his acceptance speech by describing the "collective responsibility" that alumni and friends of the university bear for ensuring its ongoing excellence.
The Hall of Fame was established 19 years ago, on the university’s centennial, to honor former students, faculty and others whose careers have brought distinction to the McCombs School. The honor goes to those who have made outstanding professional contributions to the business world, and who have also advanced humanity by their exemplary civic, philanthropic and educational activities.
The following biographies of the honorees, written by Guillermo Garcia, appear in the Fall/Winter 2002 issue of Texas, the McCombs School of Business Magazine.
McCombs School Hall of Fame, 2002 Inductees
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U.S. Secretary of Commerce
Whether on the oil patch, in the business world, or serving as U.S. Secretary of Commerce, Don Evans believes in and lives by the Texas Cowboys motto: “Give your best to Texas, and the best will come back to you.”
A native of Midland, Texas, Evans has had a long association with UT Austin. He earned both a BS in mechanical engineering in 1969 and an MBA in 1973, and met Elizabeth Susan “Susie” Marinis, his future wife. While a student, Evans was an active member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, the intrafraternity council, Omicron Delta Kappa, and the Texas Cowboys. In 1968, Evans received the Bill McGill award for outstanding member of the Cowboys, an honorary service organization, in recognition of his campus and community volunteer work.
An undergraduate in the mid-1960s, Evans vividly recalls the anti-authority messages expressed by those opposed to the Vietnam War. “I remember the huge 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,” he says. “It makes me proud that my years on campus remind me of our nation’s strengths, our freedoms: of speech, of expression, of religion.”
Evans says the university is also a place he considered home and where he began friendships that have lasted a lifetime. “The university offered me the opportunity to succeed and the independence to fail.” Fortunately, Evans succeeded much more than he failed.
Evans rose to be president and CEO of a West Texas oil and gas firm, Tom Brown Inc. Under his leadership, the firm saw its revenues increase from more than $40 million to more than $250 million between 1995 and 2000. He went on to join the Bush Administration as head of the Department of Commerce in 2001.
One of George W. Bush’s closest and oldest advisors, Evans had been Bush’s campaign manager during his unsuccessful run for Congress in 1978 and chairman of the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2000. George Bush and “Evvie,” Bush’s nickname for his longtime friend, go back more than three decades when both men were oil and gas wildcatters in Midland, scrambling to succeed in the rough and tumble energy business.
In the thirty years since Evans was a student at UT, he has become a donor to the Schools of Law, Business, and Engineering; the College of Liberal Arts; the McDonald Observatory; and the Athletics Department. Both Evans and his wife are on the Chancellor’s Council and in the Littlefield Society, as well as life members of Texas Exes. Evans served on the UT Board of Regents from 1995 until 2001, and was appointed chairman in 1997, a position he held for two consecutive terms.
“I’ve returned to campus too many times to count, but never often enough,” Evans declares. “One of the greatest blessings in my life is being part of the University family. I’m grateful for the enduring memories the University of Texas has given me and for the many opportunities it has given me 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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Deputy U.S. Trade Representative and Ambassador to the World Trade Organization
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. trade official, former member of the UT Board of Regents, and international banker, early in life had a love of history, travel, and reading that would carry her far in what was then considered a man’s domain.
Deily was born on a 250-acre farm in rural Colin County outside of Dallas. The Frazier family homestead, called Heritage Farm, was where her schoolteacher parents, William and Ruth White Frazier grew wheat, corn and cotton on land that had been in the family’s possession since the 1850s.
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,” she recalls. “The exposure to new thoughts and ideas was very exciting.”
Not surprisingly, the future ambassador and international businesswoman soon became involved in the Model United Nations. She received a Bachelor of Arts in government in 1967 and a Master of Arts in International Management in 1976. Among her fellow government majors was Lynda Bird Johnson. “I recall sharing a class (with Johnson) on ‘The American Presidency,’ and I remember thinking how very difficult it must be to hear your own father discussed in class.”
She remembers attending lectures at the Union and hearing Theodore Sorensen, a key aide to then-President Kennedy and later an award-winning historian; being mesmerized as she listened to Truman Capote reading ‘A Christmas Memory;’ and being “charmed by the creative mind” of Tom Wolfe, whose fame was still years in the future.
But it was not all 40 Acres culture and fine arts: “I became a big football fan watching the Longhorns of the Darrell Royal era. The fabulous UT-Arkansas games made me think that winning a national championship was a normal experience. I can well appreciate the pressure of the legacy that Mack Brown has inherited.”
The farm girl whose eyes were opened at The University of Texas became a pioneer in the world of international banking and investing. Prior to joining the Charles Schwab Corp., a Fortune 500 firm, Deily was chairman, president, and CEO of First Interstate Bank of Texas, a $7 billion institution with 123 branches around the state before being acquired by Wells Fargo & Co.
Appointed by President Bush as United States Ambassador to the World Trade Organization in Geneva in March 2001, Deily now puts both her government degree and her business experience to good use. In 1995, then Gov. Bush appointed Deily to the nine-member Regents board. She resigned the following year to move to San Francisco when she accepted the Schwab position.
“I have been fortunate in many of my life experiences, and my time at UT was among the best,” says Deily. “Whenever I come back to campus, I remember those good times. And singing ‘The Eyes of Texas’ at football games is always good for the spirit.”
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Former Vice Chair, EDS
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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