Happy 30th Birthday, Chronicles]rnMy warmest congratulations to Tom Fleming and his associates atrnChronicles for their influential role in the national consideration ofrnideas and principles and policies in this confused and troubled era. Happyrn30th Birthday!rnIn 1975, when some of the dust from the cultural convulsions of the 60’s hadrnsettled, I said to the Rockford College Trustees that the American ethos hadrnbeen changed profoundly, so that new priorides in the society were becomingrnincreasingly dominant, which would make it very difficidt for our collegernto fulfill the aims that we had formally entered into our statement of purpose.rnOur hope was to graduate broadly knowledgeable students who clearly appreciatedrntheir responsibiliHes as civilized individuals, ciHzens, marriage partners,rnparents, employees, and neighbors. To try to think through how we shouldrncarry forward our educational program in this environment would be a task farrntoo complex for faculty committees. I suggested we establish a nev’ divisionrnat the college, which would enlist some of the brightest minds alive to workrnfull time in addressing this critical mission. After a year of deliberations. ThernRockford College Institute was formed, and we then realized the task couldrnnot be fulfilled by restricting the work to the field of education. We had to tryrnto understand also what had happened in the primary social institutions, government,rnlaw, the media,rnthe family, literature,rnentertainment.rnW: hile we werernworking out tliernJohn A. Howard, founder of The Rockford Institute.rnLeopold lyrmand, founding editor o/^ChronicIes.rnplans for the Institute,rnI happened upon anrnabsolutely electrifyingrnarhcle in Phi BetarnKappa’s American Scholar magazine about the tyranny of the Americanrnpress. It was entitled, “The Media Shangri-La.” The author was LeopoldrnTyrmand. I buzzed my secretary and said, “Ruth, please telephone thernmagazine and find out how I can get in touch with this fellow. Even if hern1^ .^ V H ^ ^ H ^ ^ ^ K . ^Hl is in Lower or Upper Slobovia, I have to talk to him.” It turned out he wasrnJ B L • ^ %J^^^lFmBSKKk S B living in Connecticut and had been a writer for the New Yorker. We hadrna hvo-and-a-half hour lunch in New York.rnHe said that what we hoped to do was something he would very muchrnlike to be a part of, but, if we wanted to affect the national culture, the onernactivity best suited for that goal would be a new, lively, and fearlessly outspoken journal of opinion. If we would agree to that requirement,rnhe was our man. Leopold was a Polish novelist whose works were powerfully critical of the Soviet regime and couldrnonly be published in samizdat, the underground press. Hisrnbooks generated a large national audience. He was, in effect,rnPoland’s Solzhenitsyn.rnFor a long period, he had been a member of a secret organizationrnof Polish intelligentsia working on a plan for arncultural counterrevolution. Other members included LechrnWalesa and the archbishop of Krakow. As a major novelist,rnhe was invited to do a lecture tour of American campuses,rnbut there was no way the Polish government would providerna travel visa for this political heretic. Many powerfulrnPolish citizens joined in a national effort to procure a Tyrmandrnvisa. Eventually, they prevailed. One ofthe key figuresrnin that campaign was the archbishop of Krakow, who,rnas you know, became Pope John Paul II. Leopold becamernthe founding editor oi: Chronicles.rnBefore long, the Institute was separated from RockfordrnCollege. And the rest is history.rn— remarks by ]ohn A. Howard at the dinner celebratingrnChronicles”30i/i Birthday, October 14, 2006 Legal-affairs editor Stephen B. Presser, editor Thomas Fleming,rnand Rockford Institute board chairman David A. Hartmanrnat Chronicles’ 30th Birthday Dinner.rnrnrn