Funeral services have been scheduled for Saturday here for Earl L. Butz, the outspoken U.S. agriculture secretary forced from office in 1976 for making a racist joke.
Mr. Butz, 98, died Saturday at his son Bill's Washington home, said Randy Woodson, dean of Purdue University's College of Agriculture.
"It's a big loss for Purdue and Indiana agriculture," Woodson said.
Mr. Butz, a free-market advocate and a longtime dean of agriculture at Purdue University, had a relaxed and earthy style that caused problems in his public life.
He was forced to resign in October 1976 after telling an obscene joke that was derogatory to blacks.
Two years earlier, Mr. Butz apologized to the Vatican after criticizing the Roman Catholic Church's stand on birth control by using a mock Italian accent while referring to the pope.
"Let's be honest, I'm controversial. I don't hesitate to speak my mind," he said at the time.
Mr. Butz was raised on a farm in northeastern Indiana. He later earned Purdue's first doctorate in agricultural economics. He joined the school's agricultural economics faculty, rising to department head.
Mr. Butz maintained that farmers should rely on a free market driven by exports and not federal subsidies.