News Release

CHAPEL HILL – A $600,000 gift to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from alumnus and former U.S. Ambassador Anthony S. Harrington and his wife, Hope, completes a $1.6 million endowment fund to support the Institute of Latin American Studies in the College of Arts and Sciences.

The endowment fund was launched in 2001 at an $800,000 endowment challenge grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. With $200,000 committed from other donors, fund raising for the challenge grant is complete.

The Harrington gift will be matched dollar for dollar by the Mellon Foundation to establish a visiting professorship and study abroad scholarships.

Each year, the Anthony Harrington Distinguished Visiting Professorship will bring an eminent scholar to UNC from Latin America to conduct collaborative research with Carolina faculty and to teach undergraduate and graduate courses.

Harrington, U.S. ambassador to Brazil during the Clinton administration, has established the professorship in honor of statesman and personal friend, former president of Brazil Fernando Henrique Cardoso. Because of Harrington’s close ties with the country, the Harrington Visiting Professor will come from Brazil every third year.

"In our increasingly interconnected world, the United States has generally suffered an attention deficit within our own hemisphere," Harrington said. "Having had the privilege of representing our country in Brazil, Hope and I were attracted to this opportunity to enhance exchange and understanding by helping to bring distinguished scholars from Latin America to Chapel Hill and send students to study there."

The Anthony and Hope Harrington Study Abroad Scholarship will provide four undergraduate scholarships each year for students who wish to participate in a summer, semester or year-long study abroad program in Latin America. The Harringtons established the study abroad scholarship to honor Chilean President Ricardo Lagos, a distinguished scholar who taught at UNC in 1974 and 1975. Lagos received an honorary degree from Carolina in 2001.

"Anthony and Hope Harrington’s generous gift was instrumental to the success of our Mellon matching campaign," said Dr. Arturo Escobar, director of the Institute of Latin American Studies and Kenan distinguished professor of anthropology. "The Harrington Visiting Professor and Harrington Scholars will allow our program to grow significantly by adding to the vibrant scholarship and study of Latin America that our Institute has provide to the university community for over 60 years."

Harrington served as U.S. ambassador to Brazil from 1999-2001. He went with a mandate from President Clinton to upgrade U.S.-Brazil relations. In recognition of Ambassador Harrington’s work, the Government of Brazil conferred on him the Order of Rio Branco, Grand Cross.

Currently, Harrington is the president of Stonebridge International LLC in Washington, D.C. A native of Taylorsville, N.C., Harrington now lives in Easton, Md. with his wife, Hope. Their two sons also are alumni of UNC. Harrrington is presently chairman of the UNC General Alumni Association and member of the university’s Advisory Board for International and Area Studies.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has supported Latin American studies at Carolina for over a decade. Two previous endowment challenge grants in 1990 and 1994 were collaborative grants for the Carolina-Duke Consortium in Latin American Studies. The current $800,000 challenge endowment is the foundation’s largest for Carolina’s Institute of Latin American Studies. In addition to the visiting professorship and study abroad fund established by the Harringtons, several other new funds have been created to support the study of Latin America. Of special note, is the Federico Gil Fund, named in honor of the Institute’s beloved founding director, under whose leadership the Institute developed into a major center of scholarship and teaching on Latin America.

In addition to the Mellon match, the College of Arts and Sciences intends to apply for a matching grant of $334,000 from the North Carolina Distinguished Professorship Endowment Fund. State legislators created the fund in 1985 as a way to help attract and retain outstanding UNC system faculty members.

The Harrington gift counts toward the university’s Carolina First campaign goal of $1.8 billion. Carolina First is a multi-year, private fund-raising campaign to support Carolina's vision of becoming the nation's leading public university.

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Center for International Studies contact: Cindy L. DiCello, (919) 843-5287