User:Yerevantsi/sandbox/Gregorian

Vartan Gregorian

https://www.nypl.org/blog/2023/11/17/nypl-honors-vartan-gregorian-renaming-center-research-humanities?utm_campaign=NYPLSocialMedia&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com November 17, 2023 NYPL Honors Vartan Gregorian with Renaming of Center for Research in the Humanities

"short and pudgy"

By the end of his tenure, in 1989, Dr. Gregorian had raised $327 million in public and private funds for the library, placing it on a firm footing.

Languages came to him easily. “We had Armenian at home, Russian at school, and we grew up with Turkish and Persian,” he said. He recalled that after his father remarried, he could not tolerate his stepmother and ran away from home at 15.

He lived in Midtown Manhattan.

as the president of Brown University, led a five-year campaign there that raised $534 million, the most ambitious in Brown’s history

After decades as a supplicant, raising $1 billion for universities and libraries, he became a benefactor, starting with an endowment of $1.5 billion that grew to $3.5 billion over his tenure.

https://almanac.upenn.edu/articles/vartan-gregorian-former-provost-and-dean-dies

https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2021/04/16/vartan-gregorian-giant-in-the-worlds-of-higher-ed-and-philanthropy-dies-at-87/?sh=553d80321123

https://dlc.library.columbia.edu/carnegie/cul:jm63xsj5jp

Alex Marlow

Breaking the News: Exposing the Establishment Media's Hidden Alex Marlow · 2021 PAGE 63 Her father- in- law is Vartan Gregorian, president of the Carnegie

sources

He has served on boards of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, the J. Paul Getty Trust, the Aga Khan University, the Qatar Foundation, the McGraw-Hill Companies, Brandeis University, Human Rights Watch, The Museum of Modern Art, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

member of board of trustees, Museum of Modern Art, 1994. Member of board of directors, International League of Human Rights, 1984-97, Institute for Advanced Study, 1987, J. Paul Getty Trust, 1988, Institute for International Education, 1989-95, Aaron Diamond Foundation, 1990-97, Brookings Institutions, 1994-97, Aga Khan University, 1995, Human Rights Watch, 1996, McGraw-Hill Companies, Cell Therapeutics, Inc.; member, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; advisor, Annenberg Foundation.

MEMBER: Academy of Arts and Sciences (fellow), American Philosophical Society, American Antiquarian Society, American Historical Association (program chair, 1972), Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (program chair of Western Slavic Conference, 1967), Mid-East Studies Association, Council for Foreign Relations, Grolier Club, Round Table, Century Association, Phi Beta Kappa.

Gregorian’s genial humility belies his accomplishments. A 16-page resumé reveals he is a board member of 11 organisations, including the Museum of Modern Art and the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation, and has similarly served 46 other institutions in the past.

I could teach history of caucuses, history of Armenia, European intellectual history, and South Asian history, all my interests, because I had joint Ph.D. degrees in history and humanities.

John Silber: "Vartan Gregorian is one of the most imaginative and learned men I know. Although he is a superb teacher and a renowned historian, his most revealing quality is his unpredictable and compelling sense of humor, a magic carpet that carries his ideas and purposes to fruition, with remarkable frequency and minimal opposition. He has the innocence of a baby, the integrity and dedication of a saint, and the political skills of a Talleyrand."

We learn in the book that you were offered a lot of presidencies of a lot of different schools, University of California at Berkeley. 00:39:07 Vartan Gregorian Vartan Gregorian Yes. 00:39:07 Brian Lamb Brian Lamb What year was that? 00:39:08 Vartan Gregorian Vartan Gregorian 1979. 00:39:08 Brian Lamb Brian Lamb You said no. 00:39:09 Vartan Gregorian Vartan Gregorian I said no. 00:39:10 Brian Lamb Brian Lamb Why? 00:39:10 Vartan Gregorian Vartan Gregorian I had been president, provost of University of Pennsylvania for only 18 months. If I had left, the president already was lame duck or announced his retirement. My predecessor provost had resigned. The dean of engineering had gone to Lehigh, the dean of medicine had gone to Harvard. And all the deans, 13 deans of the university, 12 deans, unanimously had supported me, faculty had supported me, in view of the fact that Ill provide some stability and continuity.

You were offered New York University presidency. 00:40:15 Vartan Gregorian Vartan Gregorian No. I was one of the candidates. I was offered University of Miami presidency. 00:40:19 Brian Lamb Brian Lamb In Florida. 00:40:20 Vartan Gregorian Vartan Gregorian In Florida. I was offered University of Massachusetts presidency.

In 1995, I was offered the presidency of Columbia, but I had not finished campaign for Brown. Had they waited one more year, I would have gone, but its unseemly to leave in the middle of campaign.

Other

Since coming to Carnegie, I'm beginning to understand St. Francis of Assisi's dictum that it is in giving that we receive -- the receiver finishes the task that the giver has begun. It's something like, when a reader reads a book, he finishes the work started by the author.

What Ted Turner has done is raise the national bar for giving -- along with Walter Annenberg and George Soros, both of whom have really provided enlightened leadership in philanthropy. Turner thinks that instead of having the Forbes 400 richest people, they should print the 400 most generous people.

Q: I notice that the richest man in America is not on your list -- Bill Gates. In fact, he's long been criticized for not being philanthropic enough. Last summer, though, he announced that he was giving American public libraries some $400 million in cash and software so that they can be connected to the Internet. Did you have anything to do with this gift?

A: Three years ago, I went to see him about providing a digital reference library to American high schools. I explained how doing that would eliminate the class distinction of rich school districts having access to these materials while poor ones don't. I spent two hours with him and did not hear anything except some voice-mail message to the effect of, Why don't you be a pro bono adviser to me, like you are to Walter Annenberg?

I'm very worried about Russia, with its tremendous nuclear arsenal, unpaid military forces, impoverished scientists.

Q: What about domestic American concerns? A: Again, I can give you an outline of issues that attract me. Campaign-finance reform, immigration, the role of technology in the future of the teaching of the liberal arts, telecommunications policy are a few areas. And the education of journalists. Journalism schools are teaching journalistic techniques rather than subject matter. Journalists should be cultured people who know about history, economics, science. Instead they are learning what is called nuts and bolts. Like schools of education, journalism schools should either be reintegrated intellectually into the university or they should be abolished. I'm also interested in the aging of America. In a few decades, one in four Americans will be 65 or over. All the entertainment and all the cultural programming is done primarily for teen-agers and the middle-aged. The elderly are considered a health factor, but no one is paying attention to their cultural and educational needs.

If you saw Cinema Paradiso, that was my childhood -- there were two movie houses and the films changed every six months.

Q: Of all the jobs you've held in your lifetime, which was the most important to you? A: The New York Public Library. When I got there, the library was in great decline. Yet there was no way New York could lose it. My approach was that if I failed to renew it, it would be a great martyrdom. If I succeeded, it would be a miracle.

Q: Will you be able to be as much of a showman at Carnegie? A: I'm not a showman. I'm a missionary and a public witness -- for a cause, a message, an institution.

Q: Do you have a sense of what you would like written on your tombstone? A: No, but I always joke that I'd like to be buried in those 90 miles of book stacks that we built under Bryant Park. It's quiet, and people will leave me alone. Besides, it's fully paid for. Anne Getty contributed more than a million dollars for the topsoil over those stacks.

https://armenianweekly.com/2009/10/20/an-interview-with-vartan-gregorian-part-i/

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/GetArticleBody.aspx?id=111964

Vartan Gregorian: A Biographical Essay with Specific Focus on His Views Concerning Libraries and Librarians.

"Vartan Gregorian". hrw.org. Human Rights Watch. Archived from the original on 9 May 2019.

"Vartan Gregorian - 2000". mcgill.ca. McGill University. Archived from the original on 22 February 2020.

"Vartan Gregorian". The Globalist. Archived from the original on 22 February 2020.

"Vartan Gregorian". aub.edu.lb. American University of Beirut. Archived from the original on 22 February 2020.

Ganeshananthan, Vasugi V. (February 22, 2000). "Vartan Gregorian on Harvard". The Harvard Crimson. Harvard University. Archived from the original on 4 June 2015.

"Vartan Gregorian". The BU Bridge. Boston University. 16 May 2003. Archived from the original on 21 August 2008.

"Vartan Gregorian". 2001-2009.state.gov. United States Department of State. Archived from the original on 2 March 2015.

http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/PublicLaws/law97/res97/res97386.html http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/BillText97/SenateText97/S1090.htm Should anyone ever bring into doubt the validity of the American Dream, questioning whether it still exists, arguing that it has faded into the nation's past or that it only exists as an apocryphal part of our national folklore, he need only examine the remarkable life and accomplishments of Vartan Gregorian.

other

Lord of the Books: Vartan Gregorian, President of the Carnegie Corporation (New York City) (pp. 77-80) Huberta von Voss https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1btbz21

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/libraries/inside/ccoh_assets/ccoh_11303287_transcript.pdf

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/libraries/inside/ccoh_assets/ccoh_10511614_transcript.pdf

https://www.jstor.org/stable/27770670 interview 2006

https://news.stanford.edu/news/2006/june21/newgregor-062106.html

https://news.stanford.edu/news/2006/june21/gregtext-062106.html

Vartan Gregorian - A WORLD OF IDEAS - November 15, 1988

https://www.nytimes.com/search?query=Gregorian%252C+Vartan

Dr. Vartan Gregorian, president of the New York Public Library, described it as a national tragedy. All three were referring to adult illiteracy; "Today we have to read to digest. To read is to be fully human." http://www.nytimes.com/1984/11/27/nyregion/new-york-day-by-day-112093.html

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1986/04/14/searching-for-gregorian

https://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/2019/09/30/remembering-andrew-carnegies-legacy/

https://agbu.org/news-item/a-discussion-with-dr-vartan-gregorian-president-brown-university/

https://www.aspeninstitute.org/blog-posts/vartan-gregorian-personal-excellence/

https://newsroom.aua.am/2014/10/17/massispost-vartan-gregorian-donates-book-collection-to-american-university-in-armenia/

https://www.philanthropy.com/resources/audio/podcast-vartan-gregorian-on-k/5931/

https://www.wbur.org/worldofideas/2003/05/18/vartan-gregorian

https://www.chronicle.com/article/Carnegie-Leader-Calls-for/135890

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