Ray Heffner

{{Short description|American academic administrator (1925–2012)}}

{{Infobox officeholder

|name=Ray Heffner

|image=

|caption=

|order=13th

|office=President of Brown University

|term_start=1966

|term_end=1969

|predecessor=Barnaby Keeney

|successor=Donald Hornig

|birth_date={{birth date|1925|5|7}}

|birth_place=Durham, North Carolina, U.S.

|death_date={{death date and age|2012|11|28|1925|5|7}}

|death_place=Coralville, Iowa

|alma_mater=Yale College

|residence=

|profession=

|religion=

|spouse=

|children=

|website=

|nationality=American

|signature=

|footnotes=

}}

Ray Lorenzo Heffner (March 7, 1925 – November 28, 2012) was an American educator and president of Brown University. He served in the United States Navy during World War II and graduated from Yale College in 1948, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, the Elizabethan Club, and Scroll and Key. He earned his master's degree at Yale in 1950 and his Ph.D., also from Yale, in 1953 following the completion of a dissertation on the Elizabethan poet Michael Drayton.

Heffner was a Guggenheim Fellow for the academic year 1959–1960.{{cite web|title=Ray L. Heffner|website=John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation|url=https://www.gf.org/fellows/all-fellows/ray-l-heffner/}} In 1966, he accepted the presidency of Brown University. He resigned the presidency of Brown in 1969 stating, “I have simply reached the conclusion that I do not enjoy being a university president.”

Heffner died November 28, 2012, at Lantern Park Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Coralville, Iowa.{{cite news|title=Obituary. Ray Heffner|newspaper=Iowa City Press-Citizen|date=November 30, 2012|url=https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/press-citizen/obituary.aspx?n=ray-heffner&pid=173972188}}

A more detailed biography of President Heffner is available through Brown University's Encyclopedia Brunoniana.{{cite web|title=Heffner, Ray L.|author=Mitchell, Martha|year=1993|website=Encyclopedia Brunoniana (brown.edu)|url=https://www.brown.edu/Administration/News_Bureau/Databases/Encyclopedia/search.php?serial=H0080}}