University of Minnesota. President's Office.

The President of the University of Minnesota serves as the chief executive officer of the University and ex officio president of the Board of Regents. With offices on the Twin Cities campus, the president is supported by an executive team that includes senior vice presidents, vice presidents, general counsel, University coordinate campus chancellors, director of athletics, and president of the University of Minnesota Foundation. The University’s Office of the President was created in 1869 when the Board of Regents hired the University’s first president, William Watts Folwell.

William Watts Folwell (University President 1869-1884) was born in Seneca County, New York February 14, 1833. Prior to accepting the Presidency at the University of Minnesota, Folwell taught at Hobart College, served as an officer in the 50th New York Regiment of Volunteers, and taught at Kenyon College. During his tenure, the University launched its collegiate-level curriculum, conferring its first undergraduate degrees in 1873; developed an organizational structure of colleges and other academic programs such as extension education, started in 1882 as the Farmers’ Lecture Course; and began work on the Minnesota Geological and Natural History Survey, created by the state legislative in 1872. Folwell resigned the Presidency in 1884, serving as professor of political science and the first University Librarian until his retirement in 1906. He died September 18, 1929.

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