The Rev. Dr. Robert L. Vogel ’56 — fondly remembered by many students as “Daddy Vogs” — was Wartburg College’s 15th president, serving from 1980-1998. He died Friday, July 24, 2026, surrounded by his family, including his wife, Sally ’57, and their children, Kirk ’83 and Susan.
Vogel was a Lutheran pastor and church executive — and great-grandson of Otto Kraushaar, one of the presidents at Wartburg’s former Clinton campus. His tenure is remembered for his contagious excitement, animated by his vision for what Wartburg College could be, and his passion for our students. Many still recall one of his favorite phrases of encouragement: “No matter how good you think you are, you’re probably even better.”
It was during Vogel’s tenure that the college’s oft-recited mission statement came to be: Wartburg College is dedicated to challenging and nurturing students for lives of leadership and service as a spirited expression of their faith and learning. Vogel frequently expressed that the Wartburg experience enabled students to make connections in their lives, “to put it all together” and “discover and claim their callings.”
At a time when many colleges were focusing on off-campus attendance centers and evening programs for adult learners, Vogel committed to keeping Wartburg a residential liberal arts institution where undergraduates would live and learn together.
Wartburg is “a place that helps spark a fire, a passion, in the hearts of students and challenges them to lead and serve,” Vogel said. “Sometimes I think we do our students a disservice with the quality of community here. Will they ever experience a place like this when they leave?”
The choice to focus on the undergraduate residential experience was informed by his own years studying at Wartburg. Because he had participated in traditions like Outfly as a student, he honored and zealously guarded them as president. Any attendee of a basketball game in Knights Gym knew to look for him seated behind the scorer’s table, often rising to get the crowd fired up.
“When we stand and cheer ‘We are Wartburg,’ there’s a depth to that,” he said. “I still get choked up joining in the chant.”
Vogel championed diversity on campus through the college’s first Minority Awareness Council, the Waterloo Teachers Project, and intentional international student recruitment. He pushed for internship and off-campus experiences, leading to the creation of Wartburg West in Denver, Colo., and increased international travel offerings. He also reforged links with the college’s roots in Neuendettelsau, Eisenach, and the Wartburg Castle after the reunification of Germany.
In his 18 years as president, enrollment grew from more than 1,000 students to more than 1,500, then an all-time high. Combined with successful fundraising efforts that increased the college’s endowment tenfold, this opened the door for new possibilities under his “Decade of Opportunity” banner. That decade came to fruition in just 7 years, establishing 10 endowed chairs and professorships and enabling numerous physical improvements to campus.
Vogel oversaw the construction of the Whitehouse Business Center, the first Wartburg Bookstore, the former Visitors Center, an addition to the former P.E. Center, the Bachman Fine Arts Center, the McElroy Communication Arts Center, the Wartburg Chapel, the new Grossmann Hall, the Rada-Aleff Classroom Technology Center, and the skywalk system; the renovations of Old Main, the third floor of Luther Hall, and what is now Founders Hall; and the conversion of the president’s house into The Residence student hall.
The Wartburg Chapel was a special project for Vogel. As a man of the church, he greatly valued Wartburg’s role as a college of the church.
“Students who speak at chapel can be so honest and articulate about darkness and light in their lives,” he said. “They share sincere testimonies to God’s grace in their lives and the importance of community.”
The Vogels were the first presidential couple to live in Greenwood after its acquisition in 1986. Ground was broken on a new library on the occasion of Bob’s retirement, and the finished building was dedicated in the couple’s honor as the Robert and Sally Vogel Library.
As Ron Matthias ’54 put it in Still on the Move: “By the time of his retirement in 1998, Wartburg College — for the first time in its history — had become a bold and confident place, more than ready to take on the challenges of a new millennium.”
“We don’t reinvent the college or the Wartburg community every year,” Vogel once observed. “We stand on the shoulders of those who came before.”
We’re all standing on your shoulders now, Bob. Thank you for your vision and your service. You will be missed.
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