Contact: Jason A. Smith, communications director, Wisconsin Academy
MADISON—The Wisconsin Academy’s Board of Directors has named Linda Ware as Board President for 2015–2016. Ware, who is from Wausau, has served on the Wisconsin Academy Board for seven years as a member at large, and then as Vice President of Arts (2009–2012) and Vice President of Letters (2013–2014) before becoming President.
Ware emphasized the urgency of the Wisconsin Academy’s work, which matters as much today as in 1870, when it was founded. “We need the imaginative life of stories and poems and paintings as much as we need the crystalline clarity of science and rational thought,” she says. “Whether the focus is education or immigration or equal rights, I believe that our growth and goodness as human beings depend upon transformative access to knowledge through science, to memory through history, and to metaphor through the arts. As president, I hope to help people understand the ways in which the Academy contributes to that ‘growth and goodness,’ and provides more opportunities to share the work of the Academy with the people of Wisconsin.”
Reflecting on what it means to be president of this statewide organization, Ware said, “not only does the Academy encapsulate my interests, but it focuses increasingly on sharing connections statewide, creating partnerships, and building conversations around and between the sciences, arts, and letters.”
A professor emerita of English, Ware (pictured, right) retired after forty years of teaching at the University of Wisconsin–Marathon County. She earned a BA from Ohio Wesleyan University and an MS from the UW–Madison, where she also completed PhD course work. Her interests include women writers, American ethnic studies, and literature/visual arts connections. Ware taught courses in 20th century American and Anglo/Irish literature before and after 1945, Women’s studies in Fiction, and Minority Studies. She served also as statewide English Department Chair and Chair of Chairs for the UW Colleges. She is the wife of the late attorney G. Lane Ware, of the Ruder Ware Law Firm in Wausau. Her daughter Hilary directs litigation, privacy, and regulation for Netflix worldwide, as well as managing twins Nicholas and Eva, 9, and Theo, 7. Her son Justin is a screen and television writer. Ware returns periodically to a manuscript titled Lit with Piercing Glances: The Painting and the Painter in Contemporary Novels by Women. Having chaired several boards, including that of the Performing Arts Foundation in Wausau, she also served twelve years as an officer of the Wisconsin Arts Board.
The governing body of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters, the Academy Board comprises twenty one members from across the state. The Board sets policy and participates in strategic planning to implement the Wisconsin Academy mission: bringing people together at the intersection of the sciences, arts, and letters to to inspire discovery, illuminate creative work, and foster civil dialogue on important issues. Board members also identify resources and community partners to help the Wisconsin Academy connect Wisconsin people and ideas for a better world.
About the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters
The Wisconsin Academy produces programs and publications that explore, explain, and sustain Wisconsin thought and culture. Our public programs include the James Watrous Gallery in Overture Center for the Arts, which showcases contemporary art from Wisconsin; Wisconsin People & Ideas, a quarterly magazine of Wisconsin thought and culture; Academy Talks, our statewide series of public discussion forums; a Fellows Program, which recognizes individuals with high levels of accomplishment in their fields as well as a lifelong commitment to intellectual discourse and public service; and Wisconsin Initiatives, a program to explore major issues and solutions—currently including Waters of Wisconsin and Wisconsin’s Climate and Energy Future. The Wisconsin Academy also sponsors the Wisconsin Poet Laureate Commission and many other endeavors that elevate Wisconsin thought and culture.
