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Notre Dame Club of Mohawk Valley SUNY Hesburgh Press Release Newsletter and Announcements of the Notre Dame Club of Mohawk Valley

SUNY Hesburgh Press Release

UTICA, N.Y., Feb. 22, 1999 -- The legendary leader of America's most celebrated Catholic university will address graduates at SUNY Institute of Technology at Utica/Rome during the college's 25th commencement ceremony on May 8 at the Utica Memorial Auditorium beginning at 10 a.m.

The Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, president emeritus of the University of Notre Dame, will be the keynote speaker at the annual exercises and also will receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the State University of New York. Father Hesburgh, 81, has been awarded 139 honorary degrees, the most bestowed on an individual.

The awarding of the honorary doctorate at the Institute of Technology is the first such recognition of Father Hesburgh, a Syracuse native, by any State University of New York college.

Father Hesburgh retired as president of Notre Dame in 1987, ending the longest tenure at that time among active presidents of American institutions of higher learning. He took a one-year sabbatical and then returned to an office at the Hesburgh Library to begin writing his autobiography, "God, Country, Notre Dame," which was published in 1990 and became a national bestseller. Father Hesburgh has since written two more books, "Travels with Ned and Ted" and �The Challenge and Promise of a Catholic University."

He continues his activities at the university and as a representative of Notre Dame to national and international organizations.

Father Hesburgh's public service record has been as impressive as his contributions to American higher education. He has held 15 Presidential appointments -- most recently to the U.S. Institute for Peace -- which have involved him in a variety of social issues, including civil rights, peaceful uses of atomic energy, campus unrest, Third World development, immigration reform and many others. Father Hesburgh has also chaired the International Federation of Catholic Universities.

Among an impressive list of awards, Father Hesburgh was presented with the nation's highest civilian honor, the Medal of Freedom, in 1964 by President Lyndon Johnson. He has also received the prestigious Meikeljohn Award of the American Association of University Professors, which honors those who uphold academic freedom.

The private sector has also welcomed Father Hesburgh's contributions. He was the first Catholic priest to serve in positions such as a director of the Chase Manhattan Bank, trustee and later chairman of the Rockefeller Foundation. Also, his appointment as ambassador to the 1979 United Nations Conference on Science and Technology for Development marked the first time a priest had served in a formal diplomatic role for the U.S. government. Father Hesburgh was also the first priest elected to the Board of Overseers at Harvard University.

From 1990-1996, Father Hesburgh cochaired the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics, a group that has had a tremendous impact on the reform of college sports,

Father Hesburgh was educated at Notre Dame and the Gregorian University in Rome, where he received a bachelor of philosophy degree in 1939. He was ordained in 1943 and received his doctorate in theology from Catholic University in 1945. He joined the Notre Dame department of religion that year. At age 35, in June 1952, he was named the 15th president of Notre Dame.

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