Edward Joseph Mortola (February 5, 1917 — October 21, 2002) was an American academic and education executive who served as president of New York's Pace University from 1960 to 1984, when he became chancellor. He was the university's third president and oversaw its growth from a Lower Manhattan business school to one of the largest independent universities in the U.S., with a centrally located campus at One Pace Plaza, across from City Hall. Degrees from Fordham and service in World War II Born in New York City, Mortola graduated from Regis High School and continued on to Fordham University, receiving his undergraduate degree in mathematics in 1938, an M.A. in administration in 1941 and, following military duty during World War II, a Ph.D. in education in 1946. He taught at Townsend Harris High School and, from 1942 to 1945, served stateside in the U.S. Navy, teaching at Columbia University's Midshipmen's School. During the final year of the war, he was assigned to Madison, Wisconsin as the director of the Registration Division of the U.S. Armed Forces Institute. He rose to the rank of lieutenant commander by the end of his military service. Upon leaving the Navy at the end of the war, he returned to Fordham where, while completing studies for his doctorate, he worked as an assistant registrar. He also held a position as a mathematics instructor at another of the city's colleges, Cooper Union. While working as a registrar, he learned that nearby Pace Institute had a position open for an assistant dean. He sought the counsel of Rev. Robert Gannon, the Jesuit president of Fordham from 1936 to 1949, and recollected being advised that, "unless you turn your collar around, you'll never become president of Fordham, but you might at Pace". Long tenure at Pace University In 1947, at the age of 30, Mortola accepted a position as assistant dean at Pace Institute, founded in 1906 as an institute of accountancy by the brothers Homer Pace and Charles Ashford Pace. Following Homer Pace's death in 1942, his son Robert Pace became the Institute's second president. Mortola spent the remainder of his career at Pace, becoming dean in 1949, one year after Pace was awarded college status by the New York State Board of Regents. He was promoted to provost in 1950 and to vice president in 1954. In December 1960, upon Robert Pace's retirement, he became president,