Distinguished Alumnus

Highest honor: Bostock—accomplished undergraduate, successful businessman, university trustee—is inextricably linked to his alma mater.

It's hard to imagine current-day Duke without the influence of Roy Bostock. Likewise, it's hard to imagine Roy Bostock's life without the influence of Duke.

Perhaps the most obvious sign of Bostock's contributions to the campus is the five-story Bostock Library, dedicated in the fall of 2005. It boasts several large reading rooms, group study rooms, and informal seating areas, as well as wireless Internet and more than ninety computer workstations. The library is named for Bostock '62 and his wife, Merliee Huser Bostock '62; their children, Victoria Bostock Walters '85, Matthew Franklin Bostock '91, and Kate Bostock Shefferman '94, M.B.A. '02; and several members of their extended family who are also Duke alumni.

In naming the new library after the family, Duke was recognizing the generous financial support and years of volunteer leadership service associated with the Bostocks. Roy Bostock, who served two terms on Duke's board of trustees, beginning in 1991, is the newest recipient of another Duke honor—the Distinguished Alumni Award, to be presented during Founders' Day ceremonies on October 2.

Established in 1983 as the highest honor granted by the Duke Alumni Association, the award is given to alumni who have made significant contributions in their own fields, in service to the university, or for the betterment of humanity. Bostock was selected from nominations made by Duke alumni, faculty members, trustees, administrators, and students.

An English major who graduated with Phi Beta Kappa honors, Bostock played football and baseball at Duke. Baseball has been a part of Bostock's life since his days as a Little Leaguer. During his years at Edina High School in Edina, Minnesota, he was twice named to the All-State Team. Today he is co-owner of the Greenville Drive, a Class A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox.

After Duke, Bostock went on to earn an M.B.A. at Harvard University. For almost four decades, he worked in the advertising business, including ten years as chairman and chief executive officer of D'Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles and its successor company, The MacManus Group, a global communications-services company. He then spent two years as chairman of B/Com3 Group Inc., one of the world's leading advertising and communications holding companies.

Bostock founded and chairs Sealedge Investments, a private equity investment firm, and serves on the board of Morgan Stanley. He also chairs the boards of the Northwest Airlines Corporation and Yahoo! Inc. and is a former trustee of the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Foundation and Manhattanville College in Purchase, New York.

Applying his advertising expertise in other realms, he has been chairman of the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, a national nonprofit organization that oversees the development of advertising and communications programs to encourage teens to lead healthy, drug-free lives.

As a Duke trustee, Bostock was chair of the business and finance committee and a member of the executive committee. His other contributions as a Duke volunteer have been myriad. Among other things, he has served on the Fuqua School of Business board of visitors, been a director of the Duke University Health System, and co-chaired the Presidential Council that was set up to advise the president in the wake of the lacrosse incident.

He has also been a member of the Financial Aid Initiative development committee, the Fuqua School campaign steering committee, the executive committee of the Annual Fund, and the New York Executive Leadership Board and Development Council. He has chaired two major search committees for Duke: for the medical center vice chancellor and the athletics director.