She fought hard against 'You can't do that'

Elizabeth (Liz) Pegues-Smart wanted anyone who dreamed about going to college to have that opportunity.

"All too often I was told I can't because I'm black; I can't because I'm poor; I can't because I'm female," she once said. "For today's generation, that must change."

So Pegues-Smart, one-time president of the Minnesota State University Board (the predecessor to the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system), made it her mission to make higher education more accessible to minorities and all Minnesotans.

Pegues-Smart, of Port St. Lucie, Fla., and a longtime resident of St. Paul, died Jan. 12 of congestive heart failure. She was 77.

"She was a strong advocate for diversity on campus and in the State University offices," said John Kaul, lobbyist for the system from 1987 to 1995. "We pushed the envelope in some of the more conservative communities ... and it meant major adjustments in some."

But Pegues-Smart made sure "we stayed the course," Kaul said.

Her cause was rooted in her childhood. Growing up in a small town in Iowa, she was one of six African-American students in a high school of 800. When she wanted to go to college, she was told she couldn't enroll in college prep classes.

When her family moved to Minnesota in 1950, Pegues-Smart found office work. But eventually, she found herself at the Sorbonne University in France and the Liverpool Conservatory of Music in England when her husband, a U.S. airman, was stationed in Europe.

When she returned to Minnesota, she took a clerical position at Honeywell and eventually worked her way to becoming the first woman and first African-American contract administrator at Honeywell.

She was a member of the Minnesota State University Board from 1981 to 1995, serving as its president from 1991 to 1995, and played a key role in establishing a state university program in Akita, Japan. Pegues-Smart also worked as a program associate for the Bush Foundation for 15 years.

She was a tall and imposing woman, who often had a serious, purposeful look on her face, Kaul said. But she also was warm and caring with an earthy sense of humor, he added.

"She wasn't someone who wanted to be told what she wanted to hear," Kaul said. "She wanted to be told what she needed to know. ... She stood by her decisions and fought for what she believed in ... but she could compromise. ... She had good political sensibilities."

She is survived by her son, T. Scott Pegues of Denver; brother, Frank Castleman of Denver, nieces, nephews and grandchildren. Husbands Theodore R. Pegues and A. Frank Smart preceded her in death.