2nd Annual Library Company Lecture in Honor of John Van Horne

On April 8, Library Company members will gather at the Union League of Philadelphia for the 2nd Annual Library Company Lecture in Honor of John Van Horne. The annual series honors the former Library Company director who served for over 29 years at the helm of the organization. This year’s speaker will be historian Margaret MacMillan whose recent book The War That Ended Peace: The Road to 1914 was written to coincide with the 100th anniversary of World War I.

John Van Horne served as the chief executive officer of the Library Company from 1985 to 2014. During his tenure, he established a Research Fellowship Program for doctoral candidates and senior scholars, oversaw the automation of the library’s catalogs, and expanded the physical plant with the renovation of the Cassatt House. He has published more than a dozen articles and has edited or co-edited numerous books, including several volumes of The Papers of Benjamin Henry Latrobe, an edition of the journals, correspondence, and drawings of the great early American architect and engineer published by Yale University Press. Dr. Van Horne has been President of the Independent Research Libraries Association and has served on the boards of the Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary and the National Humanities Alliance. He is an elected member of the American Philosophical Society and the American Antiquarian Society.

Margaret MacMillan is one of the world’s leading authorities on World War One. She is the Warden of St Antony’s College and a professor of international history at the University of Oxford. Her books include Women of the Raj (1988, 2007); Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World (2001) for which she was the first woman to win the Samuel Johnson Prize; Nixon in China: Six Days that Changed the World; The Uses and Abuses of History (2008); and Extraordinary Canadians: Stephen Leacock (2009). Her most recent book is The War that Ended Peace. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a Senior Fellow of Massey College, University of Toronto, Honorary Fellow of Trinity College, University of Toronto and of St Hilda’s College, University of Oxford, and sits on the boards of the Mosaic Institute and the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, and the editorial boards of International History and First World War Studies. She also sits on the Advisory Board Institute for Historical Justice and Reconciliation and is a Trustee of the Rhodes Trust.

She has honorary degrees from the University of King’s College, the Royal Military College, The University of Western Ontario, Ryerson University, Toronto and Huron University College of the University of Western Ontario. In 2006 Professor MacMillan was invested as an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Save the date for this special celebration. Library Company members will receive a printed invitation with more details shortly. We hope to see you there!