Basic HTML Version
Meet William H. Turner, IC’s Chairman
of the Board. Few parents have seen him.
Only several handfuls of alumni have
met him. But he’s very much there – this
man behind the scenes pulling the strings
which helped shape IC’s destiny.
This destiny could have been very different
from the one that exists today. For one
thing, IC itself could have been in Greece
or Egypt, Ain Aar campus may never have
been built and IC may not have purchased
its campus let alone build a new elemen-
tary school.
Yet perhaps it was Turner’s own destiny
which assigned him the task of IC’s
survival. For somehow, the mission of this
American businessman – with no prior
links to the school - had become, for bet-
ter or worse, IC itself.
Fortunately for IC, Turner is an avid
believer in volunteer work. (And very
fortunately for IC, he can cover his own
expenses and donate bigheartedly).
For Turner, Lebanon’s tumultuous years
began around the same time he joined the
Board. Unbeknown to him, many tough
decisions were ahead.
Destiny knew what it was doing however.
Bill Turner was a force to be reckoned
with. He was, after all, accustomed to a
whirlwind lifestyle and took pertinent
decisions in his stride.
To the business world, he is the former
Vice-Chairman of Chase Manhattan
Bank (formerly Chemical Banking Cor-
poration) and President, Chief Execu-
tive Officer and Chairman of the PNC
Bank and the President and Co-Chief
Executive Officer of Franklin Electronic
Publishers and Senior Partner of Summus
Ltd., a consulting firm.
To educators, he was the founding Dean
of the College of Business at Stony Brook
University and later Acting Dean of
the Business School at Montclair State
University. Not to mention a professor in
many international universities.
Still, a long list of impressive achieve-
ments hardly prepared him for the chain
of horrendous events that had befallen the
Middle East in the 1970s and '80s.
IC was on the brink of a financial disaster.
Money was running low. Turner found
himself under pressure to relocate the
school to Greece, or Egypt, or “many
other suggested countries,” he recalled.
It wasn’t an easy decision. A wayward
shell falling on campus would have killed
hundreds. Life and death decisions were
in his hands. Next door, AUB President
Malcom Kerr was assassinated in 1984
soon after AUB took the decision to keep
the university open.
Another worry: foreign teachers. Kidnap-
ping of foreigners was at an all-time high
(a former IC director, Frank Reed, was
William H. Turner:
the man behind the scenes
4
WINTER
2011