Raymond C. Bice Jr., a longtime University of Virginia administrator and beloved psychology professor, died Thursday evening at the age of 93.

Those who knew him described him as a dedicated educator and problem solver who was devoted to UVa, his family and friends.

“No one committed more of himself to the university than Ray Bice,” Leonard W. Sandridge, UVa’s former executive vice president and chief operating officer, said in a statement. “Alumni returning to the university would inevitably ask about Mr. Bice and recall him as a favorite professor.”

In his decades serving UVa, he had leadership roles such as associate dean in the College of Arts Sciences in the late-1950s and 1960s, as well as assistant to the president and secretary to the rector and Board of Visitors for more than 20 years, beginning in 1969.

More recently, Bice, known as a talented orator, served as the university’s history officer from 1991 to 1998.

Alexander “Sandy” Gilliam Jr. followed Bice as secretary of the Board of Visitors and was a longtime colleague. He said Bice was “genuinely beloved by his students.”

“He was a good person,” Gilliam said. “He was not small-minded. He didn’t take quarrels with colleagues or things like that. He just got along with most everybody.”

Gilliam recalled Bice annually crafting an elaborate display of contraptions on Halloween.

“And the neighborhood kids would all come by for trick-or-treat,” Gilliam said. “They would be told to press a button or pull a lever, and various funny things would happen.”

“And voices would say something, and images would appear on the screen,” Gilliam recalled. ”And then a candy bar would drop out of the machine.”

Bice was known for concocting contraptions (accepted as “Bice devices” in the UVa community) for his Psychology 101 course, known as “Bice Psych,” to explain to students complex psychological concepts, according to former colleagues.

At times, more than 100 students were on a waiting list for Bice’s 500-seat lecture, according to UVa spokeswoman Carol Wood, who reported that some students even “sent flowers, poems and other treats to attempt to gain entrance to his course.”

Bice taught about 27,000 students in his 91 consecutive semesters as an instructor, according to UVa.

As clerk of the Board of Visitors, Jeanne Bailes had worked with Bice for more than 20 years. She said he found pleasure in helping others.

“He was the finest, most extraordinary man,” she said. “He just couldn’t do enough for others. He was a great teacher, a great administrator, a great leader. And he was beloved by so, so many people. ... He’s a great friend.”

Bice had faced ailments recently, but Bailes, who was with him when he died at Martha Jefferson Hospital, said “he died peacefully.”

Bice, who had served as a naval officer during World War II, married Zula Mae Baber in 1966.

She had been an associate professor of nursing at UVa, and at one point, set out to deal with recurring problems of male students sneaking into all-female nursing dormitories, according to the university.

To resolve the ordeal, she joined forces with her husband, who was in charge of providing housing for male students at the time, according to UVa. And as they monitored the problem of mingling students, the two developed their own romance. They married at the University Chapel.

Bailes said the couple had a “wonderful” but short-lived marriage, as Zula Mae died from cancer in 1975.

Bice’s family will likely make funeral arrangements within the next couple of days, Bailes said.