Dean Resigns After UA Receives Historical Gift

Although he says one thing had nothing to do with the other, Randall Woods’ resignation as dean of the UA’s Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences seemed to coincide with the Walton family’s $300 million gift to the UA in April.

Woods’ concern that the Fulbright College might not receive an appropriate slice of the pie has been reported. But John White, chancellor of the Fayetteville campus, says that’s just not so.

There’s an uneasiness among many faculty members who believe White isn’t big on things artsy and sciency. After all, one of the first things he tried to do when he got here was close the UA Press. That didn’t work, thanks largely to a donation from Tyson Foods Inc.

There’s also a theory that Woods is just too outspoken for White’s taste. Woods wrote a biography of J. William Fulbright, for whom the college is named, and didn’t pull any punches when referring to Fulbright’s dismal record on civil rights.

Woods also flaunted the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act in 1992 when Bill Clinton was running for president. Reporters were ransacking the UA library looking for the letter Clinton wrote to the UA ROTC commander back in the ’60s to try to get out of the Vietnam War. But Woods had the letter. He said he was using it for research, so he didn’t plan to return it to the library anytime soon, and he refused to make a copy of it so the rest of the world could read it. He kept the letter until after the election and helped Clinton avoid one more embarrassment.