SC Johnson CEO to deliver 2009 Hatfield Lecture

H. Fisk Johnson '79, M.E. '80, M.S. '82, MBA '84, Ph.D. '86, chairman and CEO of SC Johnson, will deliver the annual Hatfield Lecture Oct. 22 at 3 p.m. in the Statler Hall Auditorium. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Johnson is the 2009 Robert S. Hatfield Fellow in Economic Education, the highest honor Cornell bestows on individuals from the corporate sector. He is the fifth-generation family leader of the 123-year-old SC Johnson company, a global consumer packaged goods manufacturer of such products as Pledge, OFF and Glade. In his address, "A Crisis of Consumption," he will speak about challenges arising from the global consumption crisis.

At 8 p.m. Oct. 22 in Bailey Hall, Johnson will introduce the hour-long film "Carnauba, A Son's Memoir," which chronicles the 1998 trip by Samuel C. Johnson '50, Cornell trustee emeritus and former chairman of SC Johnson, and his sons Curt '77 and Fisk, to South America. Sam re-created the 1935 trip by his father, Herbert F. Johnson Jr., who went to Brazil to study the carnauba palm, a key ingredient in the Johnson company's wax products. Fisk Johnson will take questions from the audience after the film.

Since the program's inception in 1981, Hatfield fellows have included the CEOs of such companies as AlliedSignal, Corning, Procter & Gamble, GE, General Motors, DuPont, IBM, Kodak and Ford.

The Hatfield Fund for Economic Education was established by the Continental Group Foundation to honor former Continental chairman Robert S. Hatfield '37. The fund supports campus visits by distinguished business leaders, who deliver major addresses on economic issues of national importance. They are intended to serve as platforms for the exchange of ideas between the corporate and academic communities.

Media Contact

Joe Schwartz