Nancy L. Buc papers (AMS.1U.B9)

Biographical / Historical

Nancy Lillian Buc, Esq., was born in Orange, New Jersey on July 27, 1944 to Ethel R. and George L. Buc. She has one living sibling, Lawrence G. Buc (Brown '68) and one deceased sibling, Vivian E. Buc. She grew up in West Orange, New Jersey, and the suburbs of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania before moving to the Washington, DC area while in college. In the Pittsburgh suburbs, Buc attended public grade school and then the Upper St. Clair Junior-Senior High School before matriculating at Pembroke College in Brown University in 1961. At Pembroke, Buc participated in student life and served on the Student Government Association, including a term as president, and was elected to Question Club in her senior year. She was also a humor columnist for the Pembroke Record, writing Wry and Ginger under the pen name C.C. York. Buc graduated in the class of 1965 with an A.B. in American Civilization. She went on to earn an LL.B. degree from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1969 and later received an honorary Doctor of Laws from Brown in 1994.

Buc began her legal career as an attorney with the Federal Trade Commission in 1969, serving, among other positions, as Attorney-Adviser to Chairman Miles W. Kirkpatrick and then Assistant Director of the agency's Bureau of Consumer Protection – the first woman to hold those positions. In 1972, Buc joined the law firm Weil, Gotshal and Manges. She was the firm's first woman partner, remaining at the firm until becoming Chief Counsel for the United States Food and Drug Administration (the first woman to hold that job) from 1980 to 1981. In 1981, Buc returned to Weil, Gotshal and Manges and stayed there until 1994. She then left to co-found with attorney Kate Beardsley the Washington, DC law firm Buc and Beardsley. Buc retired from practicing law on March 31, 2011 at the age of 66.

During her professional years, Buc had a distinguished legal career with a strong focus on advertising law and food and drug law. She served as a Member of several major government panels, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee, the NIH Consensus Panel on Effective Medical Treatment of Heroin Addiction, the Office of Technology Assessments Advisory Panels on Government Policies and Pharmaceutical Research and Development and New Developments in Biotechnology, and the Life Sciences Research Organization's Committee on Tobacco Regulation. She was also a Member of the Institute of Medicine's Committees on Contraceptive Research and Development and NIDA Medications Development. Buc served on the Board of Directors of the Food and Drug Law Institute, including a term as Chair. She served on the boards of two publicly-held companies, Exelixis (formerly, Agritope Inc.) and Dynavax Technologies Corporation. She also served as Director of the Virginia Law School Foundation and Director of the National Partnership for Women and Families.

Buc remained deeply connected to her alma mater, serving for more than 20 years on the Brown Corporation as a member of the Board of Fellows (1980-1992) and Board of Trustees (1973-1978, 1998-2004). She was one of the early supporters of Brown's Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women and its Associates, focusing her recent work on the successful campaign to raise an endowment for the Pembroke Center Archives. She also served on the planning committee for the celebration of Brown's 250th Anniversary. [Portions of this biography derive from Bloomberg Research online.]