Former British Prime Minister John Major to deliver Washington University’s 145th Commencement address

Five prominent people to receive honorary degrees

The Right Honorable Sir John Major, former prime minister of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and a leading authority on the changing global landscape, will deliver the 2006 Commencement address at Washington University in St. Louis, according to Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton.

The university’s 145th Commencement will begin at 8:30 a.m. May 19 in Brookings Quadrangle. Major’s talk is titled “The Changing World.”

During the ceremony, Washington University will award honorary degrees to five prominent people, including a 2004 Nobel Prize winner in chemistry and a pioneering scholar of African and African-American literature. The university will also bestow academic degrees on more than 2,500 students.

John Major
John Major

The honorary degree recipients and their degrees are:

• Aaron J. Ciechanover, M.D., D.Sc., a 2004 Nobel Prize winner in chemistry and Distinguished Research Professor at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, doctor of science;

• Anna Crosslin, president and chief executive officer of St. Louis’ International Institute, doctor of humanities;

• Steve Fossett, record-setting adventurer and the first person to fly around the world alone, nonstop, in a balloon, doctor of science;

• Henry Louis Gates Jr., Ph.D., the W.E.B. Du Bois Professor of the Humanities and chair of the Department of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, doctor of humane letters; and

• John F. McDonnell, vice chairman of Washington University’s board of trustees and retired chairman of the board of McDonnell Douglas Corp., doctor of science.

John Major

Commencement will mark Major’s second visit to campus. On April 20, 2005, he was a keynote speaker at an Olin School of Business conference exploring the international business environment.

Major was appointed prime minister on Nov. 28, 1990, and re-elected when the Conservative Party won an unprecedented fourth term in office at the general election of April 1992.

Major was born in 1943 and grew up in Brixton, south London. He attended the Rutlish Grammar School but left at 16 to help support his family. He had a variety of jobs before joining Standard Chartered Bank (1965-1979), rising to the rank of bank executive.

Major became interested in politics as a teen, joining the Young Conservatives, and in 1968, won his first election to a local authority, the Lambeth Borough Council. He stood for the British Parliament twice in the 1970s, before securing election to Parliament for Huntingdon in 1979.

In Parliament, Major served in the government for 16 years, 10 of which were in the Cabinet. Commenting on his rapid rise through the ranks to prime minister, Major noted that he had only once done a government job for more than a year: he was chief secretary to the treasury from 1987-89.

His one-year positions were junior whip in 1983; senior whip in 1984; parliamentary secretary 1985; and minister of state for social security and the disabled 1986.

In July 1989, he was appointed secretary of state for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, a position he held for 94 days before being appointed chancellor of the Exchequer in October that same year.

Upon becoming prime minister in 1990, Major followed in the footsteps of Margaret Thatcher and the legacy of her government. He moved into 10 Downing Street facing a weakened party, disagreements over Europe, economic recession, violence in Northern Ireland and the likelihood of war in the Persian Gulf.

Continuing the United Kingdom’s strong ties with the United States, Major gave full support to the United States in the Gulf War of 1991, and thereafter to the U.S. position on Iraq in the United Nations. The British commitment to the Gulf War was second in size only to the United States.

Major’s seven years as prime minister were not easy ones. Unlike Thatcher, his party only had slim parliamentary majorities. Nevertheless, on May 1, 1997, he handed over one of the strongest economies any incoming government had inherited, with The Daily Telegraph in London observing that “John Major leaves a richer legacy than any of his predecessors.”

While prime minister, he also instituted public-sector reforms that became international models, and he initiated an unprecedented effort to secure lasting peace in Northern Ireland.

Since leaving office, Major continues working to secure peace in Northern Ireland, lending his support to Prime Minister Tony Blair. On New Year’s Day 1999, Major was awarded The Companion of Honour, bestowed on him by Queen Elizabeth in recognition of his initiation of the Northern Ireland Peace Process.

He discusses his leadership triumphs and defeats in “John Major: The Autobiography,” published in 1999. Major stepped down as a member of Parliament when the British general election was called in May 2001.

His business interests today include serving as senior adviser to Credit Suisse and chairman of the European Advisory Council of Emerson. He is chairman of the council of the Ditchley Foundation and a member of the international advisory board of The Peres Center for Peace in Israel. He is also a patron of the Atlantic Partnership.

His charitable interests include the presidency of Asthma UK and patron of the Prostate Cancer Charity, Wavemakers (formerly Child of Achievement Awards), Mercy Ships and Support for Africa. He also takes an active interest in the work of the Royal National Institute of the Blind, the National Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Children and the Consortium for Street Children.

On St. George’s Day, April 23, 2005, the Queen appointed Major a Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter. This is an historic honor dating from 1348 and remains solely the personal gift of the monarch.

Major has been married to Dame Norma Major since 1970 (she was made a dame of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth in June 1999). They have two children, Elizabeth and James, and one grandson, born in July 2000.

Aaron Ciechanover

Aaron Ciechanover
Aaron Ciechanover

Ciechanover has devoted a highly productive scientific career to understanding the mechanisms of protein breakdown within living cells — a vital aspect of cellular metabolism.

His early scientific work on cellular proteolysis (protein breakdown) was conducted at The Technion as a graduate student (D.Sc.) of Avram Hershko, M.D., Ph.D. Together they made the initial discovery of the ubiquitin-dependent proteolytic system, its enzymatic components and mechanisms of action.

The basic functions of ubiquitin and the components of the ubiquitinylation pathway were elucidated in the late 1970s and early 1980s in groundbreaking work performed by Ciechanover, Hershko and Irwin A. Rose, Ph.D., for which the Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded in 2004.

The ubiquitin system rigorously maintains the quality of proteins in cells by eliminating faulty and unneeded proteins. Equally important, it controls numerous basic cellular processes by removing key regulatory proteins.

Discovery of the ubiquitin pathway has led to the understanding of how the cell controls the cell cycle, DNA repair, gene transcription and some immune defense functions. Defects in the pathway have been implicated in the pathogenesis of many diseases, certain malignancies and neurodegenerative disorders among them.

As a result, a potent anti-cancer drug has already been developed, and drugs for other malignancies and diseases are likely on the way.

In addition to the Nobel Prize, Ciechanover received the 2000 Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research with Hershko and Alexander J. Varshavsky, Ph.D., for their work on the ubiquitin system.

Anna Crosslin

Anna Crosslin
Anna Crosslin

Crosslin, a 1972 Arts & Sciences graduate of Washington University with a bachelor’s degree in political science and a minor in Asian studies, has helped thousands of refugees and immigrants make a smooth transition to life in the St. Louis area.

Under Crosslin’s entrepreneurial leadership, the International Institute, which is in St. Louis’ South Grand neighborhood, has grown in size and scope. Today it is the largest resettlement agency in the state and it annually provides educational, counseling and employment services to more than 8,000 newcomers from 55 countries.

Founded in 1919, the institute is nationally recognized for its programs designed to move refugees and immigrants quickly from overwhelming dependence to productivity and self-sufficiency

During Crosslin’s 28-year tenure, the institute has led the charge to resettle refugees, resulting in the largest Bosnian community in the United States now claiming St. Louis as home.

The organization is playing a major role in revitalizing its surrounding city neighborhoods, where many immigrants are finding jobs, starting businesses and buying homes.

Recently, Crosslin launched the International Institute Business Solutions Center, a social enterprise that provides language and cultural expertise to local businesses to help them work more effectively in the global marketplace and with more ethnically diverse workforces. She is working to expand the program to more than 20 other metropolitan areas during this year.

In recognition of her leadership role among fellow International Institute directors nationwide, Crosslin was elected chair of the Standing Committee of the Professional Council of the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, the umbrella organization for the country’s International Institutes. She served from 2004-06, retiring from the position in February.

Steve Fossett

Steve Fossett
Steve Fossett

Fossett is one of the world’s most accomplished adventurers. Whether sailing around the world, swimming the English Channel or flying high-altitude gliders, he always rises to the challenge.

The holder of current official world records in five sports, he became the first person to complete a solo round-the-world balloon flight after working toward the record for seven years. The flight, his sixth attempt at the record, launched from Northam in Western Australia, on June 19, 2002, and returned to Queensland, Australia, on July 4, 2002.

During his historic circumnavigation of the world, Fossett traveled 20,602 miles, reached speeds of up to 204 miles per hour, and flew as high as 34,700 feet. Washington University served as mission control for this flight as well as three other of his balloon flights, including his 1998 launch from the old Busch Stadium.

Fossett’s spirit of adventure also is apparent in his business enterprises. He founded and managed Lakota Trading Inc., a major exchange floor market-making firm. He was a member of the New York Stock Exchange for 26 years.

Born in Jackson, Tenn., in 1944, Fossett earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Stanford University in 1966 and a master’s degree in business administration from Washington University in 1968. He received the John M. Olin School of Business Distinguished Alumni Award in 1995.

A member of the university’s board of trustees since 1995, he also serves on the National Executive Board of the Boy Scouts of America and is a member of the World Scout Committee.

Henry Louis Gates

Henry Louis Gates
Henry Louis Gates

A pioneering scholar of African and African-American literature, Gates is considered one of the nation’s foremost cultural critics and a pre-eminent public intellectual.

Gates, who is also director of Harvard’s W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research, graduated summa cum laude from Yale University in 1973. He won a Mellon Fellowship to study at Clare College at the University of Cambridge in England, where in 1979 he became the first African-American to earn a doctorate.

In 1980, as an assistant professor at Yale, he launched the Black Periodical Literature Project, devoted to studying black newspapers published in America between 1827 and 1940. The following year he received a $150,000 MacArthur Fellowship — or “genius grant” — which culminated in his re-discovery and re-publication, in 1983, of Harriet E. Wilson’s “Our Nig; or, Sketches from the Life of a Free Black” (1859), the first novel published in the United States by a black person.

Over the next several years Gates helped to define an African-American literary canon through a series of books, notably “The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism” (1988), winner of the American Book Award.

Gates has written widely on the contemporary African-American experience, in books such as “Colored People: A Memoir” (1994) and “The Future of the Race” (with Cornel West, 1996), as well as in “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man” (1997), a collection of magazine profiles.

In 1997 Gates was voted one of Time magazine’s “25 Most Influential Americans.” Other projects include developing and hosting a series of documentaries for PBS, most recently “African American Lives” (2006).

John McDonnell

John McDonnell
John McDonnell

McDonnell was destined for a career in aerospace. Born in Baltimore in 1938, he is the son of McDonnell Aircraft founder James S. McDonnell. He holds a bachelor’s (1960) and a master’s (1962) degree in aeronautical engineering, both from Princeton University.

Also an alumnus of the John M. Olin School of Business, McDonnell had a distinguished career of more than 35 years with McDonnell Aircraft and McDonnell Douglas Corp., starting in engineering and retiring in 1997 as chairman of the board.

He led the company successfully through the early 1990s when the U.S. defense budget and the aerospace markets were shrinking dramatically. In the face of a rapidly consolidating aerospace industry, he oversaw the 1997 merger of McDonnell Douglas with Boeing to create the world’s largest aerospace company.

While McDonnell has left his mark on the aerospace world, he has also made significant contributions to Washington University.

Now a Life Trustee, McDonnell was first elected a Washington University trustee in 1976. After holding various board leadership positions, he was elected chairman of the board in 1999. In 2004, he was elected to his current position as vice chairman and he now chairs the board’s Development Committee.

McDonnell also served as chairman of the leadership phase of the Campaign for Washington University. When the campaign was publicly announced in September 1998, $541 million already had been received or committed. The campaign ended June 30, 2004, with $1.55 billion in gifts and commitments, well beyond the stated goals.

A founding member in 1997 of Washington University’s International Advisory Council for Asia, he is also an Advisory Committee member for the newly formed McDonnell International Scholars Academy. He, along with the JSM Charitable Trust, provided the naming gift for this global education and research initiative partnering Washington University with top foreign universities and leading multinational corporations.