SALT LAKE CITY Former University of Utah President Chase Nebeker Peterson was remembered Monday as an unselfish man dedicated to his faith, his family and Utah.

"Not only was he smart, he had such a great heart. He cared so much for the university, about his students, and about Utah," his wife, Grethe Peterson, said. "He was just so happy here."

Peterson, a physician who gave his last lecture to medical school students in July, died Sunday of complications from pneumonia. He was 84.

Peterson's sometimes contentious eight years as University of Utah president ended in 1991. He returned to medicine, first seeing patients at the campus' Madsen Medical Center and then teaching as a member of the Family Medicine Department faculty.

Born in Logan, Peterson grew up on the Utah State University campus where his father, E.G. Peterson, served as president for 40 years. "He had a ball. He thought it was his playground," Grethe Peterson said.

At 14, Chase Peterson was awarded a scholarship to attend Middlesex School, a Massachusetts boarding school. He was the school's first Utahn and first Mormon student but never forgot his roots.

"I represented my family, my state and my church as well as myself," Peterson said in his memoir, "The Guardian Poplar," published two years ago by the University of Utah Press.

His wife said he was "thankful for his Mormon roots. That was who he was and he understood it. He felt it made him stronger to go out in the world and do what he had to do."

James Clayton, a former U. provost under Peterson, said his longtime friend stood out in academia for his committment to his faith, earning respect for having taken "a religious road in a highly secular institution and maintained his standards."

Peterson attended Harvard on scholarship, where he went to medical school and met his wife. After an internship at Yale University and serving as a doctor for the U.S. Army in Germany, Peterson returned to Utah and practiced as an endocrinologist.

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Former University of Utah President Chase Peterson dies