By Jacqueline Trescott
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 28, 2007; C01
A day after Smithsonian Secretary Lawrence M. Small's resignation, the names of possible successors began to circulate.
Cristián Samper, 41, a respected biologist and the director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, was named acting secretary on Monday, and though it was purely water cooler talk, his stock seemed to be up.
After Samper was chosen, his former boss resigned yesterday. David Evans, the Smithsonian's undersecretary for science and an oceanographer, said he was leaving "to adequately chart my own course."
Evans, who joined the Smithonian in 2002, said he had accomplished most of his objectives for overhauling the scientific side of the institution and had for some time been thinking of taking on personal projects, including a photo book on 18th- and 19th-century spas.
Evans said Small's resignation after revelations of large housing and travel expenditures didn't trigger his own decision to leave, but he said he was surprised that the Smithsonian had "hopped over" him to choose Samper as acting secretary. "Frankly, that was a little disappointing," Evans said. "I thought one of my proudest accomplishments was bringing him aboard. . . . But I have the greatest respect for Cristián."
Other potential successors to Small from the top rungs of Smithsonian management are Deputy Secretary Sheila Burke and Ned Rifkin, the undersecretary for art and the former director of the Hirshhorn Museum.
In addition to Samper, the names of several Smithsonian scientists have been mentioned, including Hans-Dieter Sues, a paleontologist and associate director for research and collections at Natural History, and Rick Potts, an anthropologist and director of the Human Origins Program, which promotes research and public awareness about human evolution. Two members of the Board of Regents also have both scientific credentials and administrative experience: Shirley Ann Jackson, a theoretical physicist and president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Walter Massey, a physicist and president of Morehouse College.
Scientists outside the Smithsonian who have been mentioned include Peter H. Raven, a botanist and head of the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis; Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astronomer and the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York; Thomas E. Lovejoy, a tropical biologist and director of the Heinz Center for Science, Economics and the Environment in Washington; and Sir Peter Crane, the former director of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, England.
Small's departure provides more than an opportunity to find a new leader. It also gives the Smithsonian a chance to rethink the qualities needed to guide a 19th-century creation through the 21st century, observers of the institution said.
In a staff memo yesterday, Samper laid out his priorities: "In the short term, I plan to focus my attention on strengthening the public trust in the Smithsonian."
Diana Aviv, president of Independent Sector, a coalition of 500 charitable groups, said a top priority should be finding someone with a well-stated vision.
"You need someone totally devoted and committed to the organization, humble and respectful of its place in America's heart. Then they have to be a fabulous fundraiser and superb administrator," said Aviv, an outsider who is a member of a Regents committee looking at the structure of the board.
She said the Smithsonian also needs a person with a deep commitment to the federal laws governing nonprofit compensation, and an ability to differentiate between the wishes of the deep-pocket donors and the needs of the institution.
An overhaul to the Regents would be a good starting point, said Aaron Dorfman, the executive director of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy. "The number one thing is to have a board that has the inclination and time to do their duties and due diligence. They have to provide the oversight necessary to run a nonprofit," said Dorfman.
He added that the Smithsonian Board of Regents has too many busy people. It is chaired by John G. Roberts Jr., the chief justice of the United States, and includes the vice president and six other elected officials.
Jason Hall, director of government relations for the American Association of Museums, said the transition provides "an opportune time to rethink goals and priorities." Once the board fine-tunes its priorities, said Hall, then the job description can be formalized. With the Smithsonian's visibility and size, others in the museum world will be closely watching. "You are probably going to require some additional skills on top of the normal to run a multiplex like that," Hall said.
One of the key decisions will be whether to choose a business executive, a scholar or a hybrid.
Several recent high-profile searches for big-city museum executives have delivered both predictable and surprising choices.
James Wood, a former director of the Art Institute of Chicago, was chosen to take over the J. Paul Getty Trust, which operates two museums in Los Angeles. But David Hillenbrand, an executive at Bayer for 28 years, was selected to lead the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh.
The Smithsonian announced this week that Alan G. Spoon, a regent who is former president of The Washington Post Co., would head the search committee for a new secretary. The other members have not been selected.
"We have gone through a period of rigorous adaptation and an upgrading of our systems. We advanced a lot over the last seven years. It has been a tremendously important period of time. Whatever we do, we are building on that," Rifkin said.
