Hass

A finance professor who taught Cornell's MBA students for 46 years, Jerome "Jerry" E. Hass died unexpectedly Jan. 22 in Ithaca. He was 72.

A professor emeritus of finance and business strategy at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, he was also the Alan Krause Faculty Fellow in Real Estate Finance. He had previously been the James B. Rubin Professor of Finance at Johnson. Hass had been a member of the Cornell faculty since 1967.

He retired to emeritus status in 2008, yet remained actively involved at Johnson. At a celebration in Sage Hall's Dyson Atrium in June of that year, Hass quoted The Beatles: "'You say goodbye, I say hello, hello, hello,'" he said. "It's a strange kind of retirement, because I'm not going anywhere!"

The Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management will be holding a memorial service to honor Professor Emeritus Jerry Hass March 1 at 3 p.m. in Sage Chapel. The service will be followed immediately by a reception in the Dyson Atrium in Sage Hall. The service is open to the Cornell community.

Hass continued to teach at Johnson and this spring was scheduled to teach Cornell Lectures in Finance, which brought high-level finance professionals to his classroom.

While Hass' engaging teaching style was legendary among several generations of MBA students, he also was a nationally recognized expert in corporate finance, energy and regulatory economics and policy, applied microeconomics, managerial finance, security analysis and investment management, and business strategy. He had testified more than 50 times in the state and federal regulatory and judicial systems, as well as before both houses of Congress.

Hass received a B.A. from St. Mary's University of Minnesota, an MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in economics from Carnegie Mellon University. During his career at Johnson, he was director of the Public Administration Program (1979-82), director of the Managerial Skills Program (1994-95), coordinator of the Investment Banking Immersion Program (1998-2001) and academic director of the Executive MBA Program (1998-2000).

In 1973 he co-authored the seminal text on managerial finance, "An Introduction to Managerial Finance" (W.W. Norton), with longtime friend and colleague Harold Bierman Jr., Distinguished Professor of Management and professor of finance. Hass had also served since 1983 as special consultant to National Economic Research Associates Inc. and as senior consultant to Charles River Associates since 2011.

He is survived by five children, 10 grandchildren and his wife, Jo.

A service for Hass is scheduled for Jan. 26, 1 p.m., at All Saints Church, 347 Ridge Road, Lansing, N.Y. A small reception will follow at the church. There will not be calling hours, at Hass' request.

In lieu of flowers the family has requested donations in Hass' honor to Catholic Charities of Tompkins County or to the Class of 1969 Scholarship in Honor of Professor Jerry Hass, Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University, 130 E. Seneca St., Suite 400, Ithaca, NY 14850.

Shannon Dortch is communications specialist and social media manager with the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management.