IOWA CITY -- David H. Vernon, professor of law, former Dean of Law, Interim Provost and assistant to four University of Iowa presidents, died of pneumonia Monday, Nov. 5, 2001, in University Hospitals.
Memorial services: 2 p.m. Thursday, Agudas Achim Congregation Synagogue, 602 E. Washington St., Iowa City. A law school memorial will be held at 4 p.m. Friday in Levitt Auditorium of Boyd Law Building. Arrangements by Lensing Funeral and Cremation Service, Iowa City.

Memorials may be given in his name to University of Iowa Foundation for the Law School, the University Hospital (UIHC) Cancer Center or the UIHC Center for Pulmonary Rehabilitation.

He was born in Boston on Aug. 9, 1925, to Bernard and Ida Cohen Vernon. He and his wife Rhoda, who he met in grade school in their native Boston, were married June 1, 1947, following his freshman year at Harvard. He enrolled there after his return from the U.S. Navy service on a PT boat in the Pacific during World War II. Following graduation from Harvard College and the Harvard Law School, he began his distinguished teaching career as an instructor at New York University Law School, where he received the LLM and SJD degrees. Later, he was a professor at the University of Houston Law School and the University of New Mexico before going to the University of Washington Law School as professor and Associate Dean.

Coming to Iowa as Dean of Law and professor in 1966-1971, David Vernon was an imaginative leader in a time of growth when the law faculty more than doubled. He championed what he described as the "Graduate College approach" to legal education, characterized by smaller classes and a richer curriculum, enhanced by advanced courses and seminars, and emphasizing much greater individual attention to the development of students' basic professional skills, particularly their research and writing. He was instrumental in recruiting minority law students through summer orientation programs at both Iowa and New Mexico.

Mr. Vernon was the Allan D. Vestal Professor of Law from 1986 to this date and before that was Iowa Law School Foundation Professor. He served as president of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) and delegate to the American Bar Association House of Delegates, representing AALS. He also was editor of the Journal of Legal Education and chair of the Board of Trustees of the Law School Admissions Council.

Speaking of his longtime friend and colleague, Law Dean N. William Hines said, "The Iowa Law School provides a quite different and higher quality legal education today because of Dave Vernon's leadership. Dave served the school superbly, first as dean and then for 30 years as a gifted teacher and scholar. Dave was a unique individual who was always there for students and faculty colleagues who needed his help. He touched the lives of literally thousands of young men and women, whose fond memories of his cheerful badgering (and red socks) will lighten the grief we all feel at his loss."

He was respected nationally in his scholarly fields -- contracts and conflict of laws -- and in transnational legal education. He was the author of six books, 30 articles, monographs and book reviews. He was invited as visiting professor at many American law schools as well as the University of Durham, England, and Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, as Fullbright Lecturer. In 1997, he received the Collegiate Teaching Award and the Regents Award for Faculty Excellence and in 2001, the Hancher-Finkbine Medallion Award.

Yet in spite of his preference for full-time teaching, he twice agreed to serve as the University of Iowa's chief academic officer in 1973-1974 and 1988-1989 and undertook special assignments for four University presidents. Known for his integrity, he worked assiduously and effectively to maintain the University's openness in time of campus unrest, to assure due process for faculty and students, and to promote inclusiveness throughout the University.

Dave and Rhoda's children are Amy Vernon and Charles Vernon and his wife, Alyse, and their grandchildren are Nathan, Carly and Michael, all of Houston. He is also survived by two sisters, Helen Krute of Baltimore and Louise Rosser of Boston.