Charles Q. Brown . . . An ECU decision maker

Biographical sketch of Charles Brown. This and other articles may be found in the University Archives.

The citation for this article is: "Charles Q. Brown . . . An ECU decision maker," Pieces of Eight, February 1, 1986.

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Early last fall, a few days after Charles Q. Brown and his wife, Barbara, sold their home in Greenville and moved to their Pamlico River house at Bayside Shores an unusually high, rain-swolen tide brought the river to their doorstep.

In fact, it was over their doorstep, under the house and covering the entire yard.

"We were beginning to wonder if we had made the right decision to move," says Brown, professor and chair of the ECU geology department. But the high water receded and the house, built on sturdy pilings, was undamaged.

Brown, symbolically speaking, is used to high water. For 20 years his quiet energy and tactful style has been employed in various positions at ECU -- as professor, administrator, department head, acting dean and, four years ago, as a candidate for the chancellorship. He knows that when water rises it will fall again and rise again. He welcomes the changes.

With boyish charm, he explains that when water is still it becomes stagnant and this analogy, he believes, applies to universities.

University Must Evolve

"We must evolve," Brown says. He speaks softly but with determination. "As a university we must evolve or we become stagnant. This has been one of the keys to East Carolina's success. We are always trying to prove something. We always have something to work for."

Brown believes ECU is moving into "the true role of a university." "While we are not divorcing ourselves from our heritage in teacher education programs, we have a lot of good research that is taking place too. We are getting more funding from prestigious sources -- the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the National Endowment for the Humanities.

"I think this support is an indication of the quality of work that we are doing. I think ECU is headed in the right direction."

Brown's goals for the geology department include a PhD program. "We already have the high quality research and teaching that would qualify us," he says.

"We also need a program in hydrogeology that would study our underground water supply. This kind of expertise is needed all over the world and particularly in North Carolina because underground water is critical to our water resources problems."

Early Decisions

Born in Roanoke Rapids, Brown moved to Henderson when he was 10 years old. His father worked in textiles and Brown was considering a career in textiles too. But instead of textile school, he chose to accompany some friends and enrolled at UNC-Chapel Hill in 1948. His first course in geology made lasting impact and influenced him to choose geology as a profession.

While at Chapel Hill, Brown met, wooed and won the former Barbara Hedgepeth of Kittrell, and they were married in 1950. He earned the BS degree in 1951 and a master's in 1953. He taught in high school for a year and moved to Clemson University in 1954. While at Clemson, he also did graduate work at the University of Tennessee. Then a graduate fellowship enabled him to complete the PhD at Virginia Polytechnic Institute (VPI) in 1959.

Daughter Beth was born in 1956 and son Chuck in 1960. Both are now ECU alumni.

A New Department

In the mid 1960s, Brown became interested in East Carolina which was then emerging as a newly designated university. With the help of a catalogue, he discovered that it had no departmental of geology.

This inspired Brown to write to Robert L. Holt, then vice president and dean of East Carolina, and propose a plan for developing a geology department. He emphasized that such a program was especially needed to serve the coastal plain.

Holt and Robert Williams, the dean of Arts and Sciences, were impressed and offered Brown the job of establishing and directing the new department. He spent 1966-67 developing the curriculum and the department was established in 1967, the same year that East Carolina received university designation.

Institutional Development

In two years, however, Brown was offered a new position -- director of Institutional Development and moved into administration.

"I guess it was because things were going so well and so rapidly with geology," Brown says. "I considered it an opportunity to move into an administrative career."

The position included administrative oversight of eight offices -- alumni affairs and foundations, the computing center, career planning and placement, institutional research, the Regional Development Institute, news bureau and public relations, sponsored programs and the Insitute for Coastal and Marine Resources.

"A diverse group of agencies," Brown says. "They had different missions -- all service-related. But it was a cooperative effort to advance the university on a broad front."

There were difficulties, of course. "Most people didn't realize, for example, the influence that computing would have today. While we were able to consolidate our administrative and academic computing centers, there was never enough money to buy enhanced hardware or to build a staff."

In many ways, however, Brown feels that work of the institutional development agencies set the stage for "very effective programs" that have evolved.

New Directions

Insitutional Development was reorganized in 1979 and placed in a newly-named Institutional Advancement division under a vice chancellor. Brown returned to the chairmanship of the geology department. By 1981, he was named acting dean of the School of Technology and held dual positions for two years.

In 1982, Brown was a candidate for the chancellorship following the resignation of Chancellor Thomas Brewer. He was among the finalists selected by a search committee.

As for his own future, Brown says "I love East Carolina University and I want to do what's best for this university."