Fisk University board chairman

Reynaldo P. Glover, 64, chairman of the Fisk University board of trustees, died Tuesday of pancreatic cancer, the Nashville school announced.

Glover, a 1965 Fisk graduate, had been chairman of the historically black university’s board since February 2004.

“He was a man of enormous vision, courage and character, values central to everything he touched and a core part of our university,” Fisk President Hazel O’Leary said.

Glover was also at the helm for the cash-strapped school’s controversial attempt to sell artworks donated to the school by Georgia O’Keeffe to raise money. That effort has become bogged down in the courts, and the school’s attorneys have said Fisk could run out of cash by the end of the year.

The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, backed by Wal-Mart heiress Alice Walton and under construction in Bentonville, Ark., wants to pay to share the paintings with the school.

Glover was born March 2, 1943, in Gary, Ind. He earned his law degree at Harvard Law School in 1968 and began his legal career as national executive director of the Law Student Civil Rights Research Council in New York.

He later went into private practice in Chicago. He was chairman of the board of trustees of the City Colleges of Chicago from 1988 to 1991.