Missing Myles

When the passing of Myles Brand was announced to us last week there was a profound and somber note in the lives of those who were fortunate enough to know him.

Quite simply, President Brand was presidential. Or perhaps I should say that he was what a president should aspire to be. He did not capitulate to the masses, nor would he waver in the face of a temporary groundswell of protest. He would spend every last fiber of his being to ensure that the students he was entrusted to protect were out of harm’s way. 

President Brand was given the awesome responsibility of keeping every mother’s son or daughter safe, while those same students were often doing their best to sabotage his mission.

President Brand and I had the unlikeliest of friendships. I grew up in Indiana, and like many native Hoosiers, was a huge fan of Robert Montgomery Knight. I distinctly recall contending that the grainy videotape of coach Knight, with his hands around the neck of former IU guard Neil Reed, was too blurry to render any conclusions.

After President Brand terminated Coach Knight, there did not seem a very good chance that he and I would have much in common.

In 2002, as luck would have it, I was elected student body president. Shortly thereafter, President Brand’s assistant telephoned me and let me know that President Brand would like to meet me.

Upon arriving at his office, we made the usual chit-chat and he said, “You are a member of AEPi, aren’t you?” I expected him to launch into a lengthy lecture about our partying habits or some other undesirable homily. Instead, he informed me that he was a fraternity brother of mine and that he wanted to come to dinner.

I learned quickly that Myles Brand was not near the childhood hero-crushing man that I imagined him to be. In public, he whole-heartedly supported whatever ideas that I and my administration devised. In private, he gave me advice that often caused me to rethink an ill-advised stand.  He helped me learn how to accept criticism for a failed idea with grace, and how to deflect praise onto others. Quite simply, he taught me to be a leader.

At IU, he absolutely and unequivocally would have done anything to protect the students who were in his charge. At the NCAA, he strove to ensure that the student in student-athlete was not silent.  

Myles Brand made tough decisions. He never made these decisions because of popularity, nor for self-advancement – he made them because they were right. The closer one stood to him the more these truths were evident.  Our friendship continued through graduation in Bloomington, through law school in Cambridge and through my first job in Chicago. 

Brand may be gone, but his legacy will live on throughout the world in the hearts and minds of the thousands of students he touched.