ELIE WIESEL, NOBEL PEACE LAUREATE, TO DELIVER TANNER LECTURE ON HUMAN
VALUES AT SNOW COLLEGE AND RECEIVE HONORARY DOCTORATE OF HUMANE LETTERS
Renowned Holocaust Survivor Received Nobel Peace Prize in 1986
EPHRAIM, Utah—March 17, 2006—Snow College today announced that Elie Wiesel, recipient of the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize, will deliver the Tanner Lecture on Human Values Monday, May 22 at 7:00 p.m. in the Eccles Center for the Performing Arts on Snow’s Ephraim campus. Snow College will present Wiesel with an honorary doctorate of humane letters prior to the speech. Admission is free and the public is invited to attend.
“This is an amazing
opportunity for the citizens of Utah to hear one of the world’s greatest
ambassadors for peace,” stated Michael T. Benson, president of Snow College.
“Professor’s Wiesel’s visit to Snow marks the first time ever
a Nobel Laureate has spoken on campus and it is a tremendous honor for us to
host someone of his stature and reputation. We thank Rabbi Shmuley Boteach for
his efforts in helping arrange this visit.”
This opportunity for Snow College and Utahns is due to the friendship President
Benson forged with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach at Oxford University in the early nineties.
Benson, whose grandfather, Ezra Taft Benson, was then president and prophet
of the worldwide Mormon Church, was completing doctoral studies while Boteach
was the Rabbi at Oxford. Rabbi Boteach ran one of Oxford’s largest student
organizations hosting world leaders lecturing on values-based issues. Benson
was a member and officer of the organization.
Rabbi Boteach, an international best-selling author of 16 books who is now host
of TLC’s weekly TV program, “Shalom in the Home,” has visited
Snow’s campus twice – once as the Tanner Lecturer. The two friends
have a goal to bring a permanent Jewish studies center to Snow College and hope
that the Wiesel lecture can be a springboard to that end.
Wiesel will arrive in Salt Lake City and have a lunch meeting with Gov. Jon
M. Huntsman Jr. and other Utah officials. A press conference may follow the
luncheon before Wiesel travels to Ephraim to deliver the Tanner Lecture. Details
about Wiesel’s speech and the press conference will be announced in late
April.
Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for his outstanding contributions
to humanity. He has authored over 40 works of fiction and nonfiction including
his best-known work, “Night” – a memoir about his experiences
in Nazi death camps. The book has since been translated into more than 30 languages
and is again near the top of the New York Times bestseller list due to its inclusion
in the Oprah Winfrey Book Club. Over one million copies of “Night”
have sold in the past three months.
The Grace A. Tanner Lecture on Human Values at Snow College is funded through
an endowment established by the O.C. Tanner Foundation. Tanner Lectures are
presented annually at many esteemed universities including Harvard, Yale, Princeton,
Stanford, Oxford, Cambridge, University of California and University of Utah.
Previous lecturers at Snow include George McGovern, Joan Mondale, Jake Garn,
Scott Matheson France Davis and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach.