March 31, 2003 Library of Congress Announces Recipients of First Library of Congress Coca-Cola Fellowships

Two Coca-Cola Fellows Will Study the Relationship of Advertising and Culture

Press Contact: Helen Dalrymple (202) 707-1940
Public Contact: Pat Loughney (202) 707-1122; Mike Mashon (202) 707-5698

The Library of Congress announced today the selection of Christopher Anderson of Indiana University and Julio Moreno of the University of San Francisco as recipients of the first Library of Congress Coca-Cola Fellowships for the Study of Advertising and World Cultures for 2003.

Administered by the Library's Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division (M/B/RS) in collaboration with the Library's Office of Scholarly Programs and the John W. Kluge Center, the fellowship is awarded on a competitive basis to researchers studying the interrelationships among advertising, culture, commerce and the media.

The fellowship provides recipients with a stipend of $20,000 each and access to resources at the Library of Congress for an extended period of in-depth, multi-disciplinary research into the Library's audio-visual and other research collections. The fellows will be provided with research facilities in the Library's new Kluge Center for the period of their research.

"The Library of Congress continually seeks new ways to make its riches available to the American people, and the Coca-Cola Fellowships offer a wonderful opportunity to open up new areas of the Library's unparalleled audio-visual collections to an emerging and important area of scholarly research," Librarian of Congress James H. Billington said in announcing the winners.

Anderson's proposal, "An Eye Made Quiet: History in the Ruins of Live Television," examines the cultural history of live television in the 1950s, especially the entwining of entertainment and advertising functions.

Moreno's proposal is "American Business, U.S. Foreign Policy, and Cold War Culture in Latin America, 1945-1990," a comparative examination of the diverse interests and approaches of American corporations and Latin American governments toward consumers.

Selection of the Coca-Cola Fellows was made by Billington, upon the recommendation of a three-person selection committee chosen from the broader academic community.

Funding for the fellowships was provided by a grant from The Coca-Cola Company in connection with the donation of its archival collection of television broadcast advertising materials to the Library of Congress in 2000. The original funding from Coca-Cola allowed for the awarding of a total of five fellowships on a yearly basis beginning in 2003. However, due to the special merit of the two top proposals by Anderson and Moreno, Billington decided to award two fellowships in 2003. Three remaining fellowships will be awarded on a yearly basis over the next three years, with applications for the 2004 fellowship accepted beginning Nov. 1. For more information, visit https://www.loc.gov/rr/mopic/cokefellowship/.

The Coca-Cola Company donated its archives of television broadcast advertising materials to the Library in November 2000 in celebration of the 50th anniversary of Coca-Cola's first TV commercial, which aired on Thanksgiving Day, 1950. The collection consists of more than 22,000 commercials that document the company's broadcast advertising, including those produced internationally.

The donation of the collection was received by the Library as part of the Library's Bicentennial Gifts to the Nation program, marking the Library's 200th anniversary in 2000. The donation represents the largest gift of corporate advertising in the Library's history and joins a rich body of broadcast advertising materials dating to the early days of radio and television.

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PR 03-058
2003-04-01
ISSN 0731-3527