April 29, 1998

Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan to Speak at Middlebury

College Commencement

Middlebury to Award Honorary Degrees to Moynihan

and Eight Others

U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York will

speak at Middlebury College’s commencement on May 24, and receive

an honorary Doctor of Laws degree. Moynihan’s tie to Middlebury

dates back to World War II, when he was a member of the U.S. Navy’s

V-12 unit stationed at the College. By the end of the war, over

1,200 Navy men from 20 different states had studied at Middlebury

as part of the preliminary portion of their officer training program.

The College also will present honorary degrees to

eight other distinguished individuals, including Jamaica Kincaid,

a resident of North Bennington, Vt., who will receive an honorary

Doctor of Letters degree. An author and former staff writer for

The New Yorker, Kincaid is an adjunct professor at Harvard University.

Her latest book is “My Brother,” which was nominated

for the 1997 National Book Award in non-fiction.

Another Vermont resident, Crea S. Lintilhac

of the Shelburne, Vt.-based Lintilhac Foundation, will receive

an honorary Doctor of Science degree. The foundation, which funds

environmental and social projects in Vermont, has supported research

at Middlebury College, including the studies of Lake Champlain

by Patricia and Thomas Manley of the geology department, and monitoring

of amphibian populations on Mount Mansfield and elsewhere in the

state by Steve Trombulak and Jim Andrews of the biology department.

The College will award Millard Dean Fuller, the founder

of Habitat for Humanity, an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters

degree. James Arvey Ibbotson, a musician, composer, member of

the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and parent of a 1998 graduate, will

receive an honorary Doctor of Arts degree. Anne Lincoln Bryant,

executive director of the National School Boards Association and

former executive director of the American Association of University

Women, will receive an honorary Doctor of Education degree.

The College also will

award Alice F. Emerson, senior fellow at The Andrew W. Mellon

Foundation, an honorary Doctor of Letters degree. Dr. Emerson’s

vision of technology-enhanced language learning has led her to

support Middlebury as the leader of a nationwide collaborative

of 62 liberal arts colleges that seek to improve language instruction

through the use of technology. Middlebury College Dean of Admissions

Emeritus Fred F. Neuberger, who worked at the College from 1955

to 1991, also will receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters

degree.

Rochford J. Thibodeau, a resident of

Burlington, Vt. who died in 1997, was a leader of the Alliance

for the Mentally Ill of Vermont. The College will award him an

honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree posthumously.