Among the many members of the extended Cornell community, trustees, alumni and friends who will be participating in the inauguration ceremonies for President David Skorton, four will play a particularly visible role. They are Provost Biddy Martin, chairman of the Cornell Board of Trustees Peter Meinig, Weill Cornell Medical College Dean Antonio Gotto and David Feldshuh, professor of theater arts and artistic director of the Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts, who will give the faculty address.

In addition, members of the Cornell Board of Trustees will be evident throughout Inauguration Day. The trustees will also hold a special meeting on Sept. 8 in the Statler Amphitheater.

Peter C. Meinig, chairman of the Cornell Board of Trustees since 2002, will preside over the ceremonies as well as conduct the formal investiture of the president during the installation of President David Skorton on Sept. 7.

Meinig '61, MBA '64, said that in his presiding remarks he will "communicate the excitement of the board of trustees in having attracted a person of David Skorton's experience and quality to lead Cornell for many years."

Meinig is chief executive officer and chairman of HM International of Tulsa, Okla., a privately held management-holding company of various manufacturing and service businesses. He is also chairman of PGI International and of Windsor Foods and director of Ninth House.

He is an ex officio member of all standing committees and of the Weill Cornell Medical College Board of Overseers. He is a member of eCornell's board and served as chairman until 2002.

Meinig also serves on the board of the Indian Nations Council of the Boy Scouts of America and on the board of the University of Tulsa. In November 2005 he was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame.

As the president's first deputy officer, the chief educational officer and chief operating officer of the university, Provost Carolyn (Biddy) Martin will play a pivotal role in inauguration events. She will preside at the academic symposium in Bailey Hall on Sept. 6, host the symposium dinner that evening and address an expected audience of more than 3,000 at the installation ceremony the following day.

Her remarks, Martin says, will focus on the university's core mission and the challenges of leadership in higher education today. She says: "I am honored to have been asked by David Skorton to speak at his inauguration. I will speak briefly about our responsibility to protect what is unique about universities and our good fortune to have a leader who understands that responsibility."

Martin received her B.A. in English literature from the College of William and Mary (1973), where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and her Ph.D. summa cum laude in German literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1985). On the Cornell faculty since 1984 and promoted to professor in 1997, Martin has served as associate director of the Women's Studies Program, chair of the Department of German Studies and senior associate dean in the College of Arts and Sciences. She was appointed provost in 2000.

Antonio M. Gotto Jr., the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean of Weill Medical College of Cornell in New York City, will be lauding a fellow physician when he speaks at the installation ceremony for President David Skorton.

Gotto will reflect on Skorton's career, on the university as the center of liberal education and on the continuation of Cornell's tradition of academic excellence, intellectual collaboration and leadership. Drawing a parallel between medicine and a liberal education, Gotto will quote from the writings of John Henry Cardinal Newman, "As the body may be tended, cherished and exercised with a simple view to its general health, so may the intellect also be generally exercised in order to its perfect state."

Gotto, who is also professor of medicine and provost for medical affairs, like Skorton, is a longtime advocate of education and research aimed at preventing cardiovascular disease. He is co-author of "The New Living Heart" and "The New Living Heart Diet," which explain the origins and dietary treatment of cardiovascular disease to the general public, and the author of "The Living Heart Cookbook."

He was previously at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, where he was professor and chairman of the Department of Medicine and scientific director of the DeBakey Heart Center. He also served as chief of the Internal Medicine Service at The Methodist Hospital in Houston.

Who better to officially welcome President David Skorton than a fellow physician, educator and saxophonist -- and another David?

David Feldshuh, professor of theater arts and artistic director of the Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts, will give the inaugural address during inauguration ceremonies Sept. 7.

"It will be a speech of welcome, of celebration and of admiration for what I have come to value about Cornell," said Feldshuh, who practices emergency medicine at Cayuga Medical Center and lectures on the role of theater in exploring social issues.

Feldshuh adapted Sophocles' "Antigone" for the Cornell stage in 2003, and he recently completed (in collaboration with three Cornell students) a new adaptation of "Little Women" to be presented later in the fall at the Schwartz Center.

His play "Miss Evers' Boys," first performed in 1989, has been produced throughout the United States and in London. It was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and won the New American Play Award. A 1997 adaptation of the play for HBO won five Emmy Awards.