New Trustees Added to Rice Board

Robert L. Clarke, Robert B. Tudor III, and Robert R. Maxfield have more than just their first names in common: All are alumni of Rice University, and all were named to the Rice Board of Trustees for a four-year term that began July 1.

Robert L. Clarke

Clarke, who was raised in Hobbs, New Mexico, graduated from Rice in 1963 with a bachelor’s degree in economics. He received a bachelor of laws from Harvard in 1966. While at Rice, Clarke served as an officer of Hanszen College and as Student Association president. A member of the Thresher staff, the Honor Council, and the Army ROTC, Clarke was named an Outstanding Senior and a Distinguished Military Student. He received the Cameron Service Award, and in 1992 he was honored as a Distinguished Alumnus of Rice.

He joined Bracewell & Giuliani LLP, where his principal areas of practice include assisting banks in the United States and abroad in matters involving state and federal banking laws, regulations and supervisory agencies, mergers and acquisitions of financial institutions, strategic planning, independent counsel to boards of directors, new financial services products, management of regulatory risk, and litigation support as an expert witness.

President Ronald Reagan appointed Clarke as U.S. comptroller of the currency—a position to which he was reappointed by President George H. W. Bush. The banks supervised by this office account for about two-thirds of the assets of the commercial banking system. When Clarke’s appointment as comptroller ended, he rejoined Bracewell & Giuliani in 1991 as senior partner and head of the firm’s financial services practice.

Clarke received the Distinguished Service Award from the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury in 1992 and the Banking Leadership Award from the Western States School of Banking in 1993.

Robert B. Tudor III

Alexandria, Louisiana, native Tudor graduated from Rice in 1982 with a bachelor of arts in English and legal studies. He received a doctor of jurisprudence from Tulane Law School in 1987.

While at Rice, Tudor was an officer of Hanszen College and student representative on the University Committee on Examinations and Standing. He lettered in basketball and received the Bob Quin Award for being the male senior athlete who most exemplified distinction in athletics, academics, and leadership.

Before attending graduate school, Tudor spent two years as a professional basketball player with Turnerschaft Raifeisen in Innsbruck, Austria, where he also had a Fulbright Teaching Fellowship.

Tudor joined Goldman, Sachs and Co. in 1987 in the Investment Banking Division in New York. He became a managing director in 1996 and was named a partner in 1998. After five years in London, where he headed the Industrial and Natural Resources Group, Tudor returned to Houston in 2005 as a managing director in the Investment Banking Division.

Houston mayor Bill White appointed Tudor to the Houston Library Board of Directors to complete an unexpired term that ends March 1, 2007. Tudor served as president of the “R” Association’s Board of Directors at Rice last year and on the Association of Rice Alumni Board of Directors.

Robert R. Maxfield

Maxfield was renamed to the Rice Board of Trustees after taking a year off in compliance with the limitation on two consecutive four-year terms. Raised in Wichita Falls, Texas, Maxfield graduated from Rice with a bachelor of arts, magna cum laude, in 1963, and a bachelor of science in electrical engineering in 1964. He also received a master’s and a doctoral degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University in 1966 and 1969, respectively.

While a student at Rice, Maxfield was a resident of Hanszen College and lettered in varsity swimming. His honor society memberships included Phi Beta Kappa, Tau Beta Pi, and Sigma Tau.

Maxfield co-founded ROLM Corp. in 1969 with three fellow Rice graduates and served as the company’s executive vice president and director. In 1984, ROLM merged with IBM, where Maxfield had worked previously, and he continued to serve as executive vice president until 1988. Since 1989, Maxfield has been a consulting professor in the Department of Management Science and Engineering at Stanford University and a director of Echelon Corp., which the Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal ranked No. 20 on its list of the region’s 50 fastest-growing companies in 2003.

Harvard Business School named the Rice co-founders of ROLM Entrepreneur of the Year in 1980, and Rice has given Maxfield three alumni honors: Distinguished Alumnus Award (2004), Outstanding Engineering Alumnus (1999), and Rice Engineering Alumni Association’s Outstanding Engineer (1964).

—B. J. Almond