Remembering Dr. Ty Tessitore
Honoring a great Furman professor.
Earlier this month, Dr. Ty Tessitore passed away at the age of 76. Today, we want to honor him.
Dr. Tessitore was a great professor, beloved by many alumni, and represents what Furman can be at its best.
A memorial service will be held this Sunday, January 18, at 2:00 PM in the Charles E. Daniel Chapel. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that memorials be directed to the Tocqueville Center.
You can join us in supporting Dr. Tessitore’s legacy by giving to the Tessitore-Nelsen Tocqueville Endowed Fund.
Finally, we invite all of you to read more about Dr. Tessitore’s life and legacy.
Dr. Ben Storey wrote a reflection for Law and Liberty, which you can read in full here.
Dr. Brent Nelsen also wrote a reflection, which he has given us permission to republish below:
It is with great sadness that I inform you of the passing earlier today of Dr. Ty Tessitore, one of the truly great Furman professors of the last half century, and a founder of the Tocqueville Center. What follows is my modest attempt to say something worthy of a man who influenced me more deeply than I may even fully know.
Ty was the very model of a teacher-scholar. He was a master of the lecture style; students were riveted to his every word. It probably didn’t hurt that Ty looked like a Greek god—ripped like a statue of Hercules—but it was his intellect that truly held the room. His dedication and excellence as an instructor were recognized in 2002 with Furman’s Meritorious Teaching Award.
He was as accomplished a scholar as he was a teacher. Fluent in Greek and French, Ty’s mastery of Aristotle was unmatched. He authored or edited two influential books and remains the only member of the Department of Politics and International Affairs ever to have published in the American Political Science Review, the discipline’s most prestigious journal. Moreover, he had begun a book on Tocqueville that a stroke tragically kept him from finishing. I once found the introduction in an old Tocqueville Center file passed on to me. I read it in awe. I suppose I’ll have to wait to read the rest when we meet again in the New Heaven and the New Earth.
Many of you know that Ty was a priest before settling in Greenville as a layman. I know little about canon law, but I do know that he remained in good standing with the Church. I also know he never lost the heart of a priest. All could see he never stopped loving his students as a pastor.
Ty wanted his students to ask big questions and to think their way toward answers by wrestling with the great works of the past. That dream lives on in the Tocqueville Center, which he founded and which now stands as his enduring legacy at Furman University. I am proud to stand on his shoulders as we continue the work he began.
Godspeed, dear friend.
