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As treasurer and executive vice president 1990-97, Culver was among the Northeastern leaders who helped reshape the university around its “smaller and better” strategy.
Robert L. Culver, a former Northeastern treasurer and executive vice president who helped lead the university through the early stages of its transformation three decades ago, died Aug. 21. He was 75.
From 1990 to 1997, Culver and other Northeastern leaders helped reshape the university around a major building campaign, a more selective admissions process and a refined budget. The new strategy, which would be known as “smaller and better,” emphasized the importance of faculty.
Culver’s financial acumen was instrumental to the early improvements of Northeastern’s infrastructure, says Jack Malone, the longtime associate vice president of facilities at Northeastern who retired in 2021 after 43 years at the university.
“He had a lot of flair and there was a lot of confidence about him,” says Malone, who retired in 2021. “He would gather information from different sources and different people and different points of view.”
In little time, Culver would transform those disparate bits of information into a strategic presentation.
“He’d be on the phone, walking back and forth, talking a mile a minute, and telling a contractor or a vendor or a company we were doing business with that they needed to step up to partner with us,” says Malone, recalling Culver’s telltale gesture of running the fingers of his right hand through his thick black hair as he made crucial arguments. “You would be in awe of what he could do with that information, of how beautifully he would dissect things and then respond.
“The whole time he would be performing, and it was because he wanted to make every contract impactful. He loved Northeastern,” Malone says.
Neal Finnegan, chair emeritus of Northeastern’s Board of Trustees, said Culver was one of the smartest people he’s ever worked with.
“I cried when Bob died,” Finnegan says. “This was a person of the highest integrity. If Bob Culver told you something, you could count on it. And many of us loved him for that.
“He was an ingenious person who was always reaching out to make the world a better place. He had great instincts for what needed to be done and how it needed to be done.”
Culver was the right financial officer at the right time for Northeastern, says athletic director Jim Madigan.
“He was a bright and driven guy who loved Northeastern because of what Northeastern was doing to transform the campus,” says Madigan, who in the 1990s worked in the facilities department under Culver and Malone. “He liked being part of that. And people on campus liked him because he was an outgoing personality and they could see he really cared about Northeastern.”
During his time at Northeastern, Culver also served on the Boston School Committee, helping to deliver a balanced budget while negotiating union contracts.
Culver was born in Ithaca, New York, and raised in Poughkeepsie. He earned a master’s degree from London School of Economics and completed an intensive non-degree program in modern Chinese language and history at King’s College, Cambridge University.
After returning to the U.S. to pursue a master’s in public administration at Harvard, he met and fell in love with Geraldine Mercadante, his wife of 46 years. Culver is survived by Geraldine and their daughter, Leah.
Culver’s versatile career began in finance and management consulting at Coopers and Lybrand, where he rose to partner.
After leaving Northeastern, Culver would work for the Cabot Corp. as chief financial officer.
“Bob helped Northeastern with a large grant from the Cabot Corporation for the renovation of Cabot gymnasium,” says Madigan, who maintained a friendship with Culver after he left Northeastern.
Culver subsequently worked for Yale as vice president for finance and administration; for Mass Development as chief executive officer; and for Sasaki as business development adviser. Throughout the years he would return to Northeastern to visit old friends and chart the university’s growth.
Malone found himself recalling the many ways that Culver invested himself in Northeastern, whether it was showing concern for employees, contributing to the beautifying plans that have resulted in arboretum status for the Boston campus, and even helping to direct traffic before concerts at Matthews Arena.
“You could tell that he loved Northeastern,” Malone says. “Because he kept coming back.”
A celebration of Culver’s life will be held at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 14, at First Church in Jamaica Plain.