Annual Report from the President and Director - National Humanities Center Report, July 1, 1998

Generous Gifts Help Launch Campaign

During the opening ceremonies of the celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the dedication of the Archie K. Davis Building, Richard Ekman, Secretary of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, announced a $3 million grant to the Center’s endowment. That gift, the generosity of the Center’s Trustees, and the support of other foundations and friends made possible the announcement of the public phase of The Campaign for the National Humanities Center, a $20 million effort to endow sixteen new fellowships by June 30, 2000.

A supporter for twenty years, The Mellon Foundation has now contributed more than $14 million to the Center. As of June 30, 1999, the Mellon gift and several other generous pledges brought to $16.5 million the amount pledged or paid toward the Campaign goal. Center supporters have created eight new endowed fellowships since November 1997, and have made gifts to complete two others.

Fellowships established or completed during 1998–99 include:

The Robert F. and Margaret S. Goheen Fellowship, established by a number of donors to honor Goheen, a founder of the Center and a former Chairman of its Board of Trustees, and his wife.

The John B. Hurford Family Fellowship, established by a member of the Board of Trustees.

The John G. Medlin, Jr. Fellowship, established by Trustee C. Dixon Spangler, Jr., in honor of a fellow Trustee.

The Dr. Assad Meymandi and Family Endowed Fellowship, established by an incoming Trustee.

The Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Fellowship, established by a Trustee’s family foundation.

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W. Robert Connor, President and Director
In the past year the National Humanities Center passed a major milestone—the twentieth anniversary of the dedication of the Archie K. Davis Building. During the months leading up to it, we put in place a scholarly conference, a reunion of Fellows from all previous years, and celebrations involving many of the Center’s good friends. Deputy Director Kent Mullikin worked closely with the Fellows’ planning committee; Bill Friday and John Hope Franklin, who had spoken twenty years earlier, prepared new remarks for the occasion; the staff managed with characteristic attentiveness and good humor the countless details of schedule, logistics, and publicity. Talks were prepared; poems written; decorations readied. The Board’s Executive Committee and everyone with responsibilities for the Center’s financial health pushed hard so that we could announce dramatic progress on a campaign designed to strengthen the fellowship program. Everyone was focused on "The Twentieth."

Everyone except the Director. To me the significance of the year was not the anniversary of the dedication of the building, late in the Center’s first year of operation, but the presence of the twenty-first class of Fellows in 1998–99. The celebration was to me not an anniversary but a birthday party, a very special birthday party, a twenty-first birthday. I insisted we were really celebrating the coming of age of the National Humanities Center.

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