KU News Release

Bailey named distinguished professor at KU

LAWRENCE — Victor Bailey has been named the Charles W. Battey Distinguished Professor of Modern British History at the University of Kansas.

The new professorship was funded by a $600,000 gift to KU Endowment from the Hall Family Foundation of Kansas City. It is part of a $7 million pledge made in 2001 for the humanities at KU, which included $2.5 million for endowed chairs. In total, the foundation pledged $42 million to the university during the KU First: Invest in Excellence campaign. It was the largest private gift ever made to a college or university in Kansas.

Bailey, a KU faculty member since 1988, is a scholar of 19th and 20th century England. He earned master’s degrees from Oxford and Cambridge universities and a doctorate from the University of Warwick in England. He received a prestigious W.T. Kemper Fellowship for Teaching Excellence in 1999. Bailey has been director of KU’s Hall Center for the Humanities since 2000.

Battey is a prominent Kansas City businessman who has been involved with KU and the Hall Center’s advisory board for more than 20 years.

“It gives us great pleasure to be able to support a professorship named for Charles Battey and held by Victor Bailey,” said Donald J. Hall, chair of the board of the Hall Family Foundation. “Both men have contributed immensely to the Hall Center. Dr. Bailey’s contributions extend beyond the center to his scholarship and teaching. He represents the finest in higher education.”

Dale Seuferling, president of KU Endowment, extended his gratitude to the Hall family for its continued support.

“This gift illustrates the outstanding generosity of the Hall Family Foundation toward KU and its firm commitment to the humanities,” said Seuferling.

The interest earned on this gift will be eligible for support from the state of Kansas through the Kansas Partnership for Faculty of Distinction program.

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