U of C Courts Obama for Presidential Library
Obama is reportedly cool to the idea
By ANDREW GREINER
Updated 9:53 PM CST, Mon, Oct 26, 2009
The University of Chicago would like to host an Obama Presidential Library.
Officials from the school have reportedly already reached out to the 44th president, still less than one year into his term as commander in chief, to consider the university where he once taught law as the location for his archives.
A spokesman for the school, however, says no contact has been made on the topic.
The location seems to make sense and would be a boon for Chicago tourism. The University is within walking distance from the Obama’s Chicago home and the school has a great tradition of producing Nobel Laureates, like Obama. Plus his wife, Michelle, worked there for some time.
But, no one from the White House was willing to comment on the idea, and senior officials say it was too soon to talk of such things, despite the fact that many past presidents have begun planning their libraries just as early.
But privately, the word is President Obama is cool to the idea of a U of C archive.
One of his close friends, Dr. Eric Whitaker told Bloomberg News that the “Obama didn’t know if that would be something he would want to do.”
Whitaker, an executive vice president at the University of Chicago Medical Center, says Obama favors a virtual library along the lines of what Jimmy Carter has at the Carter Center in Atlanta.
First Published: Oct 26, 2009 8:00 AM CST
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