Highlights & News
Interview with Jeff Nelson
Josh Lewis, host of Saving Elephants podcast, interviewed Kirk Center CEO Jeff Nelson on how he came to know and work for Russell Kirk and Kirk's major contributions in articulating the American conservative tradition. In a wide-ranging conversation, they discuss the...
“What Do Conservatives Believe?” with Mike Pence
On May 31, the Kirk Center will hold an event featuring a conversation with Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos at Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, in Grand Rapids, in honor of the 30th anniversary of Russell Kirk’s...
Talks Engaging Kirk’s Thought Elsewhere
Bishop Robert Barron, founder of Word on Fire Ministries, delivered the 2023 Russell Kirk Lecture at the Heritage Foundation on "The Breakdown of the Tocquevillean Equilibrium." Saving Elephants podcast interviewed John Wood Jr. on finding commonality between Kirk and...
Otto von Habsburg Foundation connects with the Kirk Center
In a 1959 letter to Russell Kirk, Otto von Habsburg, Archduke of Austria-Hungary, wrote: “I am very much interested to learn from your letter that you devote so much attention to the development of [the journal] ‘Modern Age.’ I think that you do here a tremendously...
The Great Books podcast features Luke Sheahan
On The Great Books podcast, host John J. Miller was joined by Luke Sheahan, editor of The University Bookman, to discuss Robert Nisbet’s landmark book, The Quest for Community. Sheahan gives a wonderfully lucid presentation on Nisbet’s argument that the human drive...
TFAS Fellows Seek Sources of Conservative Renewal
On October 20-23, the Russell Kirk Center welcomed participants from The Fund for American Studies (TFAS) to its first program held at the Kirk Center in Mecosta. An impressive class of their Public Policy Fellows, most of whom are early career professionals working...
The Fund for American Studies (TFAS) Participant Writes Article on Visiting the Kirk Center for National Review
We hope you enjoy this essay from recent seminar participant, Bobby Miller: Kirk’s life was consumed with the recuperation and preservation of what he called ‘permanent things.’ As he put it: ‘There are certain permanent things in society: the health of the family,...
Interns from the Mackinac Center for Public Policy gathered at the Kirk Center
Interns from the Mackinac Center for Public Policy gathered at the Kirk Center on July 8, 2022, for a day-long seminar on “Dimensions of Contemporary Conservatism.” Faculty speakers included Dr. Glenn Moots from Northwood University and Dr. Sarah Estelle from Hope...
Dr. Luke C. Sheahan appointed the fifth editor of The University Bookman
On November 7, 2021, the Russell Kirk Center’s flagship publication, The University Bookman, lost its longtime editor, Gerald J. Russello, to cancer. Gerald was just 50 yet had been a fixture in our world, with such a breadth of humanistic learning and a deep...
What Do Students Say about the Center?
April was a busy month of programming at the Kirk Center. Of the four educational programs we held, two were four-day seminars for graduate and undergraduate students, while the other two were shorter programs for students from Calvin University and from St. Michael’s...