The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation in Milwaukee announced Tuesday that College President Larry Arnn will be presented with a 2015 Bradley Prize at a ceremony in Washington, D.C., on June 3.
Each year, the Bradley Foundation honors four prominent individuals of extraordinary talent and dedication who contribute to the tradition of free representative government and private enterprise.
“I have been given the prize, they say, for doing a good job at my jobs, chief of which is serving the college,” Arnn said. “I will keep doing that to the best of my ability. I am nearly finished with a book about Churchill, and we still have several document volumes of the official biography to finish. The award is well-known — I expect it will help all that work.”
Arnn was chosen because of his service as president of Hillsdale College, former president of The Claremont Institute Center for Political Philosophy and Statesmanship, and his work with authorized Winston Churchill biographer Sir Martin Gilbert. The prize is accompanied by an award of a quarter of a million dollars.
“Dr. Arnn is dedicated to traditional academic purpose,” Bradley Foundation President and CEO Michael Grebe said in a statement. “He has helped to build Hillsdale College into the model of classical liberal arts education. His scholarship and leadership throughout the years deserve recognition.”
Arnn was chosen from more than 200 nominees from across the country.
“I know the foundation of old,” Arnn said. “I have recommended two people connected to the college who have won the prize in the past.”
Arnn has recommended Churchill biographer Gilbert and historian and Visiting Professor Victor Davis Hanson for the award previously.
“I know some of the members of the selection committee, including Charles Krauthammer, George Will, Victor Hanson, and Robbie George,” Arnn said. “They are serious people.”
In addition to his leadership and teaching at Hillsdale, Arnn is completing the work of publishing a book about the life, leadership, and character of Winston Churchill. The book, titled “Churchill’s Trial: Winston Churchill and the Salvation of Free Government,” will be released next January. He’s now considering what to make his next project.
“I have an opportunity to write another book,” Arnn said. “As anyone who is near to finishing one, I would rather be skinned than do that, but likely I will change my mood about that. I like to write about the things that I teach, and I have done that for two of them now.”
Kimberley Strassel of The Wall Street Journal, who spoke at Hillsdale in 2013, was honored by the Bradley Foundation last year.
“Through the Bradley Prizes, we recognize individuals like Dr. Arnn, whose accomplishments strengthen American institutions, with the hope that others will strive for excellence in their respective fields,” Grebe said.
