Fred Glass
BY MALCOLM ABRAMS • PHOTOGRAPHY BY RODNEY MARGISON
On October 28, 2008, Indiana University President Michael A. McRobbie held a press conference to announce the appointment of George Frederick (Fred) Glass as vice president and director of intercollegiate athletics. Glass replaced Rick Greenspan, who had resigned in the aftermath of the Kelvin Sampson recruitment scandal. He would become the fifth IU athletic director in eight years.
Lore has it that McRobbie told the search committee he had one requirement and one only—that the successful candidate have experience as an athletic director. Glass had none. But he did have an impressive resume.
Born in Indianapolis, Glass earned his undergraduate degree at IU–Bloomington and a law degree at the IU Robert H. McKinney School of Law in Indianapolis. He worked as a corporate and business attorney and as chief of staff for Indiana Governor Evan Bayh. He served as president of the Marion County Capital Improvement Board, which owns and operates the Indiana Convention Center and Lucas Oil Stadium. He was president of the Indianapolis 2011 Super Bowl Bid Committee and also sat on Indianapolis organizing committees for NCAA and Big Ten basketball tournaments.
On January 1, 2009, Fred Glass, then a 49-year-old father of four, began his first day on the new job. Considering the rapid turnover of athletic directors at IU, few people would have predicted that a decade later he would still be at the helm of IU Athletics. Clearly, he has exceeded all expectations.
Bloom Editor-in-Chief Malcolm Abrams sat down with Glass in his spacious office in the north end zone of IU Memorial Stadium to talk about all that’s transpired in the past 10 years.
