Sheldon Hackney: David Boies Professor

Dr. Sheldon Hackney, professor and chair of history, has been named the David Boies Professor in SAS, Dean Samuel H. Preston announced.

President Emeritus Sheldon Hackney led Penn from 1981 to 1993, during which time Penn more than quadrupled its endowment and reaffirmed its commitment to undergraduate education. He then served for four years as chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, after accepting a nomination by then-President Bill Clinton.

Dr.  Hackney returned to Penn in 1997 and teaches courses on the South since the Civil War, the 1960s, and the American identity.  His outstanding teaching and service have earned him a Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching, Rex S. Morgan, Sr. Friar of the Year Award, and Graduate School of Education National Award of Distinction.

In addition to being a distinguished historian of the American South, Dr. Hackney speaks and writes about cultural and educational policy and contemporary cultural issues. He is the author of five books including From Populism to Progressivism in Alabama, which received the Albert J. Bevridge Prize for best book on American history, and his latest, The Politics of Presidential Appointment: A Memoir of the Culture War.   

Before he came to Penn in 1981, he served as president of Tulane University and as provost of Princeton University. He holds a B.A. from Vanderbilt University and a Ph.D. from Yale University. 

The David Boies Professorship was established in 2003 by David and Mary Boies in memory of Mr. Boies's father, a former high school history teacher. As chairman and founding partner of the law firm of Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP, Mr. Boies has served on some of the most high-profile cases in the nation. In recent years, he has represented the United States Department of Justice in its antitrust suit against Microsoft and has served as the lead counsel for former Vice President Al Gore in connection with the electoral recount in Florida. Mrs. Boies is a partner and attorney with the law firm of Boies & McInnis LLP.

  Almanac, Vol. 51, No. 6, October 5, 2004

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