The John Weaver Story
John Carrier Weaver
USC Department of Geography Chair (1971-1977)
John Weaver was born on May 21, 1915, in Evanston Illinois. His father, A(ndrew). T. Weaver, was a professor of speech at Wisconsin from 1918 to 1961, and John graduated from the University of Wisconsin High School and then received his AB (1936), AM (1937), and PhD (1942), all in geography, from the University of Wisconsin. From 1940-1942 he was on the staff of the American Geographical Society, from 1942-1944 researcher for the Division of Geography and Cartography of the U. S. Department of State, and from 1944-1946 an Arctic intelligence officer in the Navy. Weaver taught geography at the University of Minnesota from 1946-1955, then became dean of the College of Arts and Science at Kansas State University (1955-1957). He left Kansas State to become dean of the Graduate College at the University of Nebraska (1957 1961), vice president for research and dean of the Graduate College at the University of Iowa (1961-1964), and vice president for academic affairs at The Ohio State University (1964-1966). From 1966 to 1970, Weaver served as president of the University of Missouri System. On October 27, 1970, the regents elected Weaver president of the University of Wisconsin. and he took office officially in January 1971. When the University of Wisconsin System was created in October of that year, Weaver became its first president. Weaver retired from UW System as of June 30, 1977, and moved to Los Angeles where he was a distinguished professor of geography at the University of Southern California and the first executive director of the Annenberg Center for the Study of the American Experience. He died in Rancho Palos Verdes, California on March 10, 1995.