After months of planning, British lord and author Alan Watson and Edwina Sandys, granddaughter of Sir Winston Churchill, will visit Fulton this week.
"The excitement is building," said Tim Riley, director and chief curator of the National Churchill Museum. "We're expecting a great turnout for Lord Watson's speech in the historic gymnasium and the opening of the new exhibit. It's quite an honor that Lord Watson will be on hand."
The event commemorate Churchill's visit to Fulton in 1946 and his ground-breaking speech made here about the threat of the Soviet Union. Parts of Thursday's program will nod toward that historical event. The honored guests will be served the same noon luncheon menu enjoyed by Churchill and President Harry Truman, including a special Callaway County ham.
Right Honorable Lord Alan Watson of Richmond, England, is an award-winning BBC broadcaster and former president of the Liberal Party. Churchill's granddaughter Edwina Sandys is the sculptress responsible for the magnificent "Breakthrough" sculpture on the Westminster College campus, which she created from eight actual panels of the Berlin Wall. She is the 1997 recipient of the United Nations Society of Writers and Artists Award for Excellence.
Since Churchill's visit, the National Churchill Museum was constructed on the Westminster campus grounds, at 501 Westminster Ave. At 2:15 p.m. Lord Watson will formally open the museum's new exhibition, "Sinews of Peace and the Power of Prose." This exhibition will focus on Churchill's mastery of language and how the words in his famous "Sinews of Peace" speech, or the Iron Curtain speech as it is more commonly known, changed the course of history.
The centerpiece of the exhibition will be Churchill's original draft of the Iron Curtain speech with handwritten corrections dictated by Churchill to his secretary Edith Nina "Jo" Sturdee. This marks the first time the speech has been exhibited in its draft form.
"Viewers will be able to experience Churchill's edits to his most famous post-war speech, hear rare audio, watch video clips and see photographs and never-before exhibited documents, including correspondence between Churchill, President Harry Truman and Westminster College President Franc McCluer," Riley said.
The exhibition is made possible in part by the Sandra L. and Monroe E. Trout Endowment at Westminster College.
A public reception hosted by the Mid-Missouri Friends of the National Churchill Museum will be held following the ribboncutting at the museum, and Lord Watson will sign copies of his latest book, "Churchill's Legacy: Two Speeches to Save the World." His new book analyzes the impact of Churchill's two greatest post-World War II speeches, which he delivered at Westminster College and later that year in Zurich, Switzerland.
At 6 p.m. Lord Watson will deliver a speech on "Churchill's Legacy: A Speech to Save the World" in the same Historic Gymnasium where Churchill delivered the Iron Curtain speech. Lord Watson's speech is free and open to the public.
Decorating the stage will most likely happen on Wednesday, Riley said.
"We will be transforming a Division 3 basketball and volleyball space to a world-class lecture hall that day," he added. "There will be drapery and bunting on the stage and the same historic lecturn Churchill used, so it's quite a nice tie to the past."
Immediately following the speech, a dinner will be held at 7 p.m. for Lord Watson in the Mueller Leadership Hall. Tickets to the dinner can be purchased through the Museum at nationalchurchillmuseum.org/lord-watson56056.html or by contacting Meda Young at [email protected] or 573-592-5602.