E. Craig Sweeten, W’37, the legendary former senior vice president for Developement and University Relations at Penn, died on August 7 at the age of 100.

Mr. Sweeten graduated from Penn’s Wharton School and as Bowl Man of his class, he was elected one of four “Honor Men” in his senior year. He was the class’s perennial president, starting in his freshman year.

Mr. Sweeten began working for the University of Pennsylvania two days after graduation and was a member of the administration until his retirement in 1981. He began as an alumni field worker with the University’s Bicentennial Campaign until its culmination in 1940, when he was appointed to the University’s Placement Service as assistant director and later as director.

A lieutenant commander in the Naval Reserve, he served in the Pacific and other stations for four years during World War II.

During his career, he served as director of Colonial Penn Insurance Co., Bellevue Stratford Hotel, Walter B. Gallagher Co. and the Good Neighbor Foundation of Bay Village in Florida.

In 1956, he was named Penn’s director of development (Almanac February 1956). In 1965, he became vice president for development and public relations, in which capacity he was responsible for the operations of the Offices of the Director of Development and the Director of Public Relations (Almanac April 1965). For 11 years, State Relations was also his responsibility, and he was almost as much at home in Harrisburg as he was on campus.

Mr. Sweeten became senior vice president for Program for the Eighties in 1975 (Almanac October 7, 1975). This encompassed the supervision of the University’s five-year, $225 million fundraising campaign, which was completed on schedule on June 30, 1980 (Almanac July 10, 1980).

In January of 1981, the University of Pennsylvania presented Mr. Sweeten with the Alumni Award of Merit, calling him “a man nationally respected for his experience and insights in the art of raising funds for higher education, and whose immeasurable contributions gave the University energy and direction…” (Almanac January 13, 1981).

When he retired from the University, the Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania named a building on Locust Walk to house the General Alumni Society, the department of Alumni Relations, the Alumni Council on Admissions and The Pennsylvania Gazette as the E. Craig Sweeten Alumni House (Almanac July 14, 1981).

Mr. Sweeten spent the next 20 years in the Pocono Mountains in Skytop, Pennsylvania, where he served as a Trustee of East Stroudsburg University and a director of the Pocono Medical Center. He was named “Man of the Year” by the Pocono Chamber of Commerce.

The Sweetens moved to Venice, Florida, where Mr. Sweeten was an elder of the Venice Presbyterian Church and a member of the local Venice/Nokomis Rotary Club. For four years, he was president of the local Penn Alumni Club and on the board of directors of the Sarasota Ivy League Club.

In 1990, the Sweetens moved to Bay Village, a long-term continuing care retirement community in Sarasota, Florida. There, Mr. Sweeten was active in the Pine Shores Presbyterian Church. He had been married for 37 years to Nancy Rafetto Leech Sweeten, former vice dean of Penn’s College of Women and a lecturer in the English department at Penn, who died in 2005.

Mr. Sweeten is survived by two daughters, Barbara Lynn Schabel and Jane Elizabeth Gillis, CW’70; a stepson, Douglas Leach, WG’83; six grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Pine Shores Presbyterian Church, 6135 Beechwood Avenue, Sarasota, FL 34231.