Harvard University houses a new exhibit displaying Salzburg Global's historical records
On Thursday, November 3, a new exhibit opened at Harvard University’s Pusey Library: A Marshall Plan of the Mind: 75 Years of the Salzburg Global Seminar.
The exhibit features a range of archival materials, including letters from the post-war period describing the need for exchange among rebuilding European countries to participant applications during the Cold War. Through this, it tells the story of Salzburg Global Seminar’s evolving identity and historic commitment to bridging divides through authentic human interaction.
The exhibit also highlights Salzburg Global Seminar’s close relationship with Harvard University, from the founding of “The Salzburg Seminar in American Civilization,” as it was first known, by three Harvard students - Clemens Heller, Dick Campbell and Scott Elledge - to the participation of Harvard faculty and students in programs today.
The opening night of the exhibit gathered Salzburg Global friends and Fellows spanning five decades to share reflections on their personal and collective histories. Among the guests were Fellows Nilgun Gokguru and Charlie Weiansky who met at a 1976 session Social Justice: Policy Options for Income Distribution and married six years later, Ukrainian "Synchrodogs" artists Roman Noven and Tania Shcheglova, and former Salzburg Global Library Fellow Allison Maier, to only name a few.
Harvard University Archivist Virginia Hunt, who visited Salzburg in 2019 to begin the process of bringing Salzburg Global’s archives to Harvard, spoke to guests about how Salzburg Global Seminar and Harvard’s shared history weaved through world events.
Martin Weiss, President of Salzburg Global Seminar, spoke to guests about a historical document in the exhibit reflecting the value of personal initiative that is, and always has been, central to Salzburg Global Seminar programs. An excerpt from this document said the following:
Not the least important feature of the first Salzburg Seminar is the fact that it was conceived and realized entirely by a group of Harvard students without the help of any large-scale organization. It must stand, therefore, as an encouragement to those American students who still believe in the value of personal initiative, and who have as yet not succumbed to that rising bureaucratic submissiveness succinctly expressed by the remark, apropos of the present undertaking, “Why, if the army is not doing it, should Harvard do it?”
Fortunately, Heller, Campbell and Elledge did not let that comment stop them.
A Marshall Plan of the Mind: 75 Years of the Salzburg Global Seminar was curated by the Harvard University Archives team and is open to the public at the Harvard Pusey Library through January 31, 2023. Should you find yourself in Boston this winter, we welcome you to stop by to see how Salzburg Global Seminar Fellows have been shaping a better world since 1947!
