Senator Frank Moss. Within a month after his defeat, Wilkinson returned to BYU, but members of the Board of Trustees maintained that Harvey Taylor remain chancellor. As consolation, Wilkinson was granted a $20,000 salary, the largest salary of any BYU employee at the time. BYU presidency The First Era: 1951–1957 Beginnings After Howard S. McDonald resigned from his position as BYU president, Christian Jensen served as interim president for about ten months. In 1949, at a dinner for Jensen, Wilkinson gave a speech asserting the ways in which he believed BYU could excel. He expressed that he had high aspirations for the school and believed in the values of combining a spiritual and secular education. After the dinner, Wilkinson was invited to share his ideas with the church's First Presidency and the Board of Trustees. The favorite candidate of J. Reuben Clark to fill the vacancy of BYU president was the vocally conservative Wilkinson, who lobbied LDS Church leaders to be appointed as president of BYU and was offered the position in July 1950. Wilkinson refused to be paid a salary, which attracted church officials in the aftermath of tense financial negotiations with previous president, McDonald. In September 1950, Wilkinson changed the members of the Board of Trustees from local members to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles with the First Presidency serving as president and vice presidents, respectively, of the board. Wilkinson wanted a direct line of communication to McKay, the church president at the time. Wilkinson would frequently counsel directly with McKay, avoiding the Board of Trustees. From 1951 to the end of 1952, Wilkinson had no official assistants besides William F. Edwards, the dean of the College of Commerce, and William E. Berrett, a professor of religion. At the end of 1952, Harvey L. Taylor became Wilkinson's first administrative assistant. Wilkinson was considered by most of his subordinates difficult to work with, citing him as dictatorial and inconsiderate. At 5'5", his nicknames among colleagues were "Little General" or "Little Napoleon". Aware of his difficulty getting along with his employees, he claimed he "[didn't] have time to be polite". Unification and CES In 1953, in an attempt to unify church schools, Wilkinson was named administrator of the church's schools. Besides his duties at BYU, he oversaw the administrative duties of Ricks College (now Brigham Young University-Idaho), LDS Business College, the McCune School of Music, and Juarez Academy in