Charles E. Young, Former UCLA Chancellor Who Spearheaded Bruins Move to Rose Bowl, Dead at 91

Charles E. “Chuck” Young, who was chancellor of UCLA for a record 29 years and whose legacy is still deeply felt across the Westwood campus, died of natural causes on Sunday, Oct. 22 at his home in Sonoma, California. He was 91.

Named chancellor in 1968 at age 36, he remains the youngest chancellor ever appointed in the University of California system and the only UCLA alumnus to hold the campus’s top position.

Young was at the forefront of UCLA’s push to relocate its football program’s home field from the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena in 1982. 

On behalf of the then–Pac-8 Conference and the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association, he led the negotiating committee for the television rights to the annual Rose Bowl football game.

The Rose Bowl Stadium named its home locker room in honor of Chancellor Young, recognizing his historic tenure as Chancellor and, in particular, recognizing the decision he made in 1982 to select the Rose Bowl as the home field of UCLA football.

The seventh of UCLA’s nine chief executives, Young presided over UCLA in the turbulent 1970s and the belt-tightening 1990s, yet he managed to leave the campus far stronger and more prestigious than ever, overseeing its transition from a regional institution to a world-class research university.

“During his long tenure, Chuck Young guided UCLA toward what it is today: one of the nation’s most comprehensive and respected research universities and one that is profoundly dedicated to inclusiveness and diversity,” said UCLA Chancellor Gene Block. “He faced head-on the many challenges of his time, and his principled leadership positioned UCLA to meet the many challenges of the future.”