Donald R. Bagin, 70, professor

Donald R. Bagin, 70, a Rowan University professor who coordinated media coverage of the 1967 Soviet-U.S. summit conference in Glassboro, died at home in Sewell on Tuesday of multiple-system atrophy, a neurological disease.

Mr. Bagin became director of public relations at Rowan, then Glassboro State College, in 1965 and taught courses in the communications department.

Two years later, in June 1967, he helped stage a public relations coup for the school when President Lyndon B. Johnson and Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin met at the college president's residence, Hollybush. It was the first superpower summit since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis.

Kosygin had come to the United States to speak to the United Nations. There was pressure on the heads of state to meet, but Kosygin wouldn't travel to Washington, and Johnson refused to go to New York. Richard J. Hughes, then govenor of New Jersey, suggested Glassboro as a compromise.

All the famous faces from television and print were there, Mr. Bagin told a reporter in 1992. The most difficult thing, he recalled, was treating equally the 750 reporters and cameramen crammed into the school's gym.

Dan Rather attended the same interview with a reporter from the Woodbury paper. Mr. Bagin had to tell his idol, newspaperman Jimmy Breslin, that he couldn't let him ahead of everyone else.

The leaders met without incident, although Mr. Bagin remembered that in a final sweep of Hollybush, Secret Service agents found a Japanese reporter huddled in a closet hoping for the scoop to end all scoops.

Mr. Bagin often gave speeches about his summit experience and appeared on CBS television in 1987 on the summit's 20th anniversary.

Mr. Bagin established an innovative graduate program in educational communications at Rowan. During his more than 40 years there, he taught more than 2,000 students and wrote more than 300 articles and 15 books, including a popular text he coauthored, The School and Community Relations, which has been translated into several languages, including Chinese and Polish.

In 1981, he founded a firm called communications briefings. The company, which started as a newsletter, became the producer of educational videos, audios, publications and confererences for corporate and government organizations, universities, and nonprofits. Mr. Bagin sold the firm in 1994.

"Don was a witty punster who always challenged his students and employees to reach their full potential," said Ed Moore, a Rowan professor and managing editor of communications briefings.

Mr. Bagin continued to advise students until the 2006 fall semester.

A graduate of Lansdale Catholic High School, he earned a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in education administration from Villanova University and later earned a doctorate in education from Temple University. He taught math in the Souderton School District and at Carl Sandburg Middle School in Levittown, where he met another teacher, Carole Rennie. They married in 1966.

While at Glassboro, Mr. Bagin was also public information officer for the New Jersey State Department of Education for a brief period.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by sons Gary and Brian; a daughter, Cathy Trimble; a brother; a sister; and eight grandchildren who fulfilled his life as his health declined, his wife said.

Friends may call today from 5 p.m. and participate in a farewell tribute at 8 p.m. at McGuinness Funeral Home, 573 Egg Harbor Rd., Sewell.

A Funeral Mass will be said at 10 a.m. tomorrow at Our Lady of Lourdes Church, 500 Greentree Rd., Glassboro. Friends may call at the church from 8:30 a.m.