knox in the tribune

today's must-read: this GORGEOUS article on Knox College in today's Chicago Tribune. i am so proud.

edit: stupid chicago tribune requires registration! here's the text of the article:

Little Knox College rates big names as commencement speakers

By Lucinda Hahn
Tribune staff reporter
Published May 22, 2006

The president of Knox College, Roger Taylor, wouldn't want you to think he's gloating.

But he is.

That's because Knox is proving to be The Little College That Could -- could land the nation's coolest commencement speakers, that is.

This year, Stephen Colbert, star of Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report," will address the Class of 2006 on June 3.

Which may or may not top last spring's coup, when Sen. Barack Obama flew in from the capital to speak to Knox's Class of 2005.

Obama's appearance prompted a flurry of calls and inquiries to Galesburg from other college administrators -- including one from the dean of students at Harvard Law, Obama's alma mater -- demanding to know how a quiet school of 1,245 students, set amid Illinois' western cornfields, had nabbed the It guy of the Democratic Party.

"I loved it," Taylor recalls, clearly relishing his role as a sort of Santa Claus to Knox's senior classes -- which present him with a wish list of speakers in the spring preceding their graduation.

Getting Obama was a feat. But getting Colbert? That even impressed Obama.

"He said, `What? Stephen Colbert? How did you get him?" said Taylor, recalling an exchange he had with Obama when he saw the senator in December.

Indeed, Colbert's buzz has been near-deafening ever since April 29, when his acidic roasting of President Bush at the White House Correspondents Dinner -- with the president and first lady in the audience -- garnered mixed reviews but unequivocally positioned him as a speaker who will pull no punches.

So, how did Knox get him, and Obama before him?

Not with a hefty fee -- Knox doesn't pay its graduation speakers. But the college has a couple of well-placed moles -- influential alums -- at its disposal.

One is former Clinton Chief of Staff John Podesta (Class of '71) -- who is as connected as anyone in Washington, D.C. Once Podesta learned that the senior class had requested Colbert, he e-mailed the comedian.

"I'd been on a panel with him at the HBO Comedy Festival, in 2004, so I shot him an e-mail and put in a plug," Podesta says. "I think I just told him it was a great place, with a great history and student body."

In Obama's case, Podesta saw the senator at a function in Washington. "I think I bent his ear a little bit," Podesta admits.

Two other Knox alums leaned on Obama too: Illinois state Sen. Don Harmon ('88) and Skadden Arps attorney Charles F. Smith ('84)

In both cases, Taylor had issued a formal invitation via letter, extolling Knox's abolitionist history. The college was founded in 1837 by social reformists opposed to slavery, and in October 1858, Abraham Lincoln made his strongest anti-slavery argument to date in Knox's Old Main hall during the fifth Lincoln-Douglas debate.

Old Main still graces Knox's campus, and it's the only still-standing site of a Lincoln-Douglas debate. That's not a bad backdrop for any commencement speaker -- including the one Taylor hopes to, and probably will, land for next year.

"I've invited," Taylor reveals, "William Jefferson Clinton."