University of South Carolina Historian Named National Humanities Center Fellow

May 14, 2009

COLUMBIA, SC – May 14, 2009 – University of South Carolina associate professor of history Dr. Thomas Lekan has been named a National Humanities Center Fellow for the 2009 – 10 academic year. Lekan is among 32 distinguished scholars from institutions in the United States and abroad to be named a fellow.

Lekan will conduct research on green tourism in Germany. Specifically, he will study how the popular 20th-century German nature conservation led to outdoor leisure among the masses and, ultimately, an awareness of global dimensions of environmental problems.

“Tom Lekan’s enthusiasm for research is contagious,” said Dr. Lacy Ford, chairman of the university’s history department. “That contagion has revealed itself in his influence on graduate and undergraduate students, as well as a number of interdisciplinary initiatives across campus, which he has organized or assisted.”

Lekan is the fourth University of South Carolina scholar to be named a fellow by the NHC. Previous fellows have included Dr. Daniel Littlefield (1988 – 89), Dr. Dan Carter (1990-91) and Dr. Patricia Sullivan (2001 – 02).

“Since 2000, the university’s history department has won more than a dozen of the most prestigious fellowships of this kind, including ones from the NEH and Fulbright, and faculty members have been awarded more than $12.2 million in grants. This is a record few institutions, regardless of reputation, can match,” Lacy said.

The NHC is located in Research Triangle Park, N.C. This year’s awards total more than $900,000. Funding is made possible by the center’s endowment, grants from the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, the Jessie Ball DuPont Fund, the National Endowment for the Humanities and by alumni contributions.