Kennan Will Become University Professor

George F. Kennan will come to Harvard next fall to assume the post of University Professor--one of only ten men to hold that title.

Reports in Washington Wednesday said that Kennan would resign his present position as U.S. Ambassador to Yugoslavia by this summer to accept the University's offer to the prestigious professorship.

According to a story in the New York Times, Kennan has been dissatisfied for some time with his present job and with the limited extent of his influence on Administration policy.

No Official Comment

When contacted about the appointment last night, David W. Bailey '21, secretary to the Corporation, absolutely refused to comment on it, saying he was not responsible for announcing Corporation appointments. The story of Kennan's appointment was released by wire services yesterday and was carried in news-papers across the country. "I can't say anything about it," Bailey declared.

Dean Ford said yesterday that he knew nothing about the rumored appointment, but remarked that there has been considerable talk of it in the last two years.

As a University Professor, Kennan would be free to pursue his own program of teaching and research, without regard to specific departmental obligations.

One of the foremost advocates of the "realistic" approach to foreign policy, Kennan is the principle author of the policy of containment which was adopted by the United States in the late 1940's.

Kennan is a former Ambassador to the Soviet Union, and returned to the Foreign Service in January, 1961, when the Kennedy Administration came into office. Before that he had been a professor at Princeton University's Institute for Advanced Study, where he devoted himself to a study of 20th century diplomatic history. His latest book, Russia and the West, was published in 1958. Among his other books are Russia, the Atom and the West, and American Diplomacy, 1900-1950.

Kennan is a former Godkin lecturer. He last appeared at Harvard in April, 1960, to lecture on the Soviet Union under Stalin.