Research Triangle Park, N.C.  The National Humanities Center Board of Trustees has elected Carl H. Pforzheimer III as its new chairman. He succeeds Francis Oakley, President Emeritus of Williams College, as the Chairman of the Center's Board.

A Trustee of the Center since 1996, Pforzheimer is manager of Carl H. Pforzheimer and Company LLC in New York, and president of the Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation, whose interests include advancing education, the arts, citizen participation, and libraries. The Center is the recipient of a grant establishing the Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Fellowship, awarded annually to an outstanding scholar selected from a variety of humanities disciplines. This year's recipient is poet John L. Wilkinson from the University of Notre Dame.

Pforzheimer is a director of the Ampco-Pittsburgh Corporation and a former director of the U.S. Trust Corporation. In addition to serving as a trustee of the National Humanities Center and the New York Public Library, he is also chairman emeritus of Pace University. In 2002, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Prior to his election to the chairmanship of the Center's Board, Pforzheimer had worked as the chairman of the Education Programs Committee where he was instrumental in establishing and building the Center's education programs that enhance humanities training and teaching in America's secondary schools.

Since graduating from Harvard, where he majored in English literature, Pforzheimer has not only been a successful business leader, but a stalwart supporter of humanities scholarship and education, both at the university and secondary levels.

He continues to be heavily involved with programs at Harvard, the American Academy, and the New York Public Library that involve scholarly research. Of his deep and continuing interest in humanities scholarship Pforzheimer says, "It's come home to me that pure research is necessary. Pure research in the sciences and pure research in the humanities is, by faith, beneficial to our society over time. It develops the ideas, it looks at the past, it provides a glimpse of the future. I look forward to working with the staff of the Center and my fellow board members as we continue the strong legacy of contributions that the Center has made as a place that encourages scholarly pursuits and makes their fruits available for America's teachers and students."

"We have been extremely fortunate to have Carl as a board member for the past 10 years," says Geoffrey Harpham, President and Director of the Center, "and we are delighted to have him continue his service to the Center in his new role as chairman of our board. We have seen wonderful progress under the leadership of Frank Oakley, and we expect Carl will help us build on those accomplishments as we move into our fourth decade of operations."

To learn more about the National Humanities Center and its programs, please contact Don Solomon (dsolomon@nationalhumanitiescenter.org) or visit the Center's Web site at nationalhumanitiescenter.org.

The National Humanities Center is the nation's leading major independent institute for advanced study in all fields of the humanities. Privately incorporated and governed by a distinguished board of trustees from academic, professional, and public life, the Center provides a national focus for the best work in the liberal arts, drawing attention to the enduring value of ancient and modern history, language and literature, ethical and moral reflection, artistic and cultural traditions, and critical thought in every area of humanistic investigation. By encouraging excellence in scholarship, the Center seeks to insure the continuing strength of the liberal arts and to affirm the importance of the humanities in American life.