David Cass, Penn prof for 34 years

DAVID CASS was so highly thought of at the University of Pennsylvania and by his many friends that people who learned of his death last week actually stood outside his home near the Penn campus and wept.

Former students of this highly regarded economics professor kept notes from his lectures for years, treasuring them for their clear and incisive take on the finest points of esoteric economic theory.

There are those in academia who think that David Cass could qualify for a posthumous Nobel Prize in conjunction with other experts in economics, he was that well-known and regarded around the world.

"He had an amazing impact," said his son, Steve Cass.

David Cass, the Paul F. and E. Warren Shafer Miller Professor of Economics at Penn and a professor there for 34 years, died of natural causes last Tuesday. He was 71 and lived within walking distance of the university in West Philadelphia.

"For as long as I can remember," wrote George J. Mailath, chairman of the Penn Economics Department, "he had been a cornerstone of the graduate program at Penn. All of the Penn graduate students . . . felt a rare loyalty and connection to Dave.

"He will always be remembered as a pre-eminent thinker in his field," his son wrote, "but even more as an inspiring teacher and mentor whose legacy is exhibited in the high quality of people who are leading in the field of economics today."

David authored numerous articles for academic journals and a number of books on economic conditions and theory.

He was an outspoken champion of academic and personal freedom, and bristled when Penn considered enacting a regulation banning romantic relations between teachers and students stemming from his dating of a graduate student in the mid-'90s.

He was 57 and she was 31 at the time and he saw no problem in having a consensual relationship with her, which endured for a number of years.

However, David believed the situation was the reason he was denied the chairmanship of the graduate program in the Economics Department, a post he had fully expected to receive.

But Penn said it was because he lost his temper when questioned about the relationship by a vice provost.

"I told this woman in no uncertain terms that my private life was none of her goddamn business," he said at the time.

He made it clear that he felt a principle of freedom needed to be upheld and the proposed regulation went nowhere.

David Cass was born in Honolulu and grew up in Oregon. He graduated from the University of Oregon in 1958, and received his doctorate from Stanford University.

He was a member of the Economics Department and the Cowles Foundation at Yale from 1965 to 1970, and Carnegie Mellon from 1970 to 1974, when he joined the Penn faculty.

In 1999, he was named a Distinguished Fellow of the American Economic Association, and in 2003 was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

David liked to kick back at the mountain home he built in 1974 in Sullivan County, Pa. He was famous for his lavish parties at his home in Philadelphia, held in appropriate weather on his roof deck, which has a spectacular view of the campus and Franklin Field. "It would be packed with people," his son said.

He frequently attended 76ers and Phillies' games, and liked to visit the Borgata Casino in Atlantic City.

Among his survivors are a cat named Euler and a fish named Sam. In addition to them and his son, he also is survived by a daughter, Lisa Cass; a sister, Muriel Larson; his ex-wife, Janice Cass; and two granddaughters.

Services: Are private. *