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Guy Stanton Ford Lectureship Program

Guy Stanton Ford, professor of history, was president of the University of Minnesota from 1938 to 1941. With his earlier service as graduate school dean, he helped to transform the University of Minnesota into one of the nation's top research and graduate institutions.

After his death in 1962, Ford's family, friends, and colleagues established an endowment fund for the Guy Stanton Ford Memorial Lecture. This lecture, now held once every two years, brings to the University of Minnesota distinguished scholars from many different areas of inquiry, reflecting Ford's own broad intellectual interests.

Ford Lectures are free and open to the public.

Past Lectures

• 2013 Lisa Randall, physicist
• 2011 Michael J. Sandel, political philosopher
• 2008 Scott Momaday, author, Native American scholar, poet
• 2007 Thomas Insel, M.D., Director of the National Institute for Mental Health
• 2006 Elaine Pagels, religion scholar
• 2005 Clay Jenkinson, interpreter of Thomas Jefferson
• 2003 David McCullough, historian and author
• 2002 Richard Leakey, paleoanthropologist and conservationist
• 2001 Margaret Atwood, author
• 2000 Stephen E. Ambrose, historian and author
• 1999 James Randi, professional skeptic
• 1998 Berthold Holldobler, biologist
• 1997 Persi Diaconis, mathematician
• 1996 Vincent Courtillot, geologist
• 1995 John Mortimer, screenwriter
• 1994 Richard Dawkins, biologist
• 1993 Billy Taylor, jazz pianist
• 1992 John R. Searle, philosopher
• 1991 Stephen Schneider, climatologist
• 1990 Nicolas Slonimsky, musicologist
• 1989 Thomas J. Palaima, archaeologist
• 1988 Bryce Crawford, educator
• 1987 Athol Fugard, playwright
• 1986 Stephen Jay Gould, biologist

To request accommodation for a disability, such as a sign language interpreter, for future scheduled lectures, please contact the Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost.