The Sigmund H. Danziger Jr. Memorial Lecture in the Humanities is an annual honorary bestowed upon an "established scholar of classical literature, who has made substantial contributions to the critical analysis of classical literature, or has been exceptionally skilled at inspiring an appreciation for classical literature" by the Humanities Division of the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

. Sigmund H Danziger Jr. (1916–1979) founded Homak Mfg. Co. Inc. in 1947 in Chicago. A Chicago southsider and son of a sales representative for houseware products, including bathroom scales, Danziger began his business career "jobbing" for Chicago manufacturers while a student at the University of Chicago (graduated 1937). After the World War II, in which he served as a captain and translator, he purchased a bathroom cabinet manufacturer on the south side of Chicago for which he was jobbing. Naming the new company Homak, capturing a sign he noted on a hat store, he began manufacturing steel kitchen cabinets and rapidly moved to a building, which he designed at 4433 S. Springfield Ave in Chicago. In the early 1960s, an order for tool boxes lead to the production of a hardware line including roller cabinets, tool boxes, and other accessories. Through the 1970s and 1980s, most of the major retailers and chains of the time became either line or private label customers at one time or another, including

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co., commonly known as Sears ( ), is an American chain of department stores and online retailer founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosen ...

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores in the United States and 23 other ...

Kmart Kmart ( ), formerly legally registered as Kmart Corporation, now operated by Transformco, is a department-store chain and online retailer in the United States and Territories of the United States, its territories. It operates four remaining Kma ...

Lowe's Lowe's Companies, Inc. ( ) is an American retail company specializing in home improvement. Headquartered in Mooresville, North Carolina, the company operates a chain of retail stores in the United States. As of October 28, 2022, Lowe's and i ...

The Home Depot The Home Depot, Inc., often referred to as Home Depot, is an American multinational corporation, multinational home improvement retail corporation that sells tools, construction products, appliances, and services, including fuel and transportat ...

True Value The True Value Company is an American wholesaler and Hardware store brand. The corporate headquarters are located in Chicago. Historically True Value was a cooperative owned by retailers, but in 2018 it was purchased by ACON Investments. In Oc ...

Ace Hardware Ace Hardware Corporation is an American hardware retailers' cooperative based in Oak Brook, Illinois, United States. It is the largest non-grocery retail cooperative in the United States. Founded on October 25, 1924, as "Ace Stores", the co ...

Montgomery Ward Montgomery Ward is the name of two successive U.S. retail corporations. The original Montgomery Ward & Co. was a mail-order business and later a department store chain that operated between 1872 and 2001; its common nickname was "Monkey Wards". ...

, Coast-to-Coast,

Costco Costco Wholesale Corporation is an American multinational corporation which operates a chain of membership-only big-box warehouse club retail stores. As of 2021, Costco is the third-largest retailer in the world, and as of August 2024, Cos ...

Meijer Meijer Inc. (, ) is an American supercenter chain that primarily operates throughout the Midwestern United States. Its corporate headquarters are in Walker, Michigan. Founded in 1934 as a supermarket chain, Meijer is credited with pioneering ...

Pep Boys Pep Boys is an American automotive aftermarket service chain. Originally named Pep Auto Supply, the company was founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1921 by Emanuel "Manny" Rosenfeld, Maurice "Moe" Strauss, W. Graham "Jack" Jackson, and Moe ...

Fingerhut Fingerhut is an American catalog/online retailer. Fingerhut is distinguished from other online retailers in that it incorporates a technique known as hire purchase, where customers can pay with credit, and make monthly payments until their ord ...

, NAPA,

Restoration Hardware RH (formerly Restoration Hardware) is an upscale American home-furnishings company headquartered in Corte Madera, California. The company sells its merchandise through its retail stores, catalog, and online. As of August 2018, the company operate ...

, etc. In 1979, Sigmund Danziger died and his wife Gertrude (Trudy)(1919-2021), who was known as "The Toolbox Lady" in the hardware industry, ran the company for the next 25 years. During this time, the company moved to a facility in

Bedford Park, Illinois Bedford Park is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States, and is an industrial suburb of Chicago. The population was 602 at the 2020 census. Bedford Park consists of a small residential area and vast amounts of heavy industry sprawling ...

at 5151 W 73rd St. while sales grew to over $100,000,000 with hardware, automotive, hospital (under Homed TM), and sporting goods lines. One of the major innovations during this period was the introduction of a consumer gun cabinet (under HomSafe TM), which instantly grew to be a major hit at mass retailers, including

Bass Pro Shops BPS Direct, LLC, trade name, doing business as Bass Pro Shops, is an American privately held sporting goods retailer that offers hunting, fishing, camping, and other related outdoor recreation equipment, marine manufacturing and sales, and outd ...

Gander Mountain Gander Mountain, later known as Gander Outdoors and Gander RV, headquartered in St. Paul, Minnesota, was a retail network of stores for hunting, fishing, camping, and other outdoor recreation products and services. History Gander Mountain Inc ...

Dick's Sporting Goods Dick's Sporting Goods, Inc. (stylized in all caps as DICK'S Sporting Goods) is an American chain of sporting goods stores founded in 1948 by Richard "Dick" Stack. It is the largest sporting goods retailer in the United States and is listed ...

and

Sports Authority Sports Authority, Inc. (formerly The Sports Authority) was an American sports retailer based in Englewood, Colorado. At its peak, Sports Authority operated 463 stores in 45 States and Puerto Rico. The company's website was on the GSI Commer ...

. Also a line of garage cabinets was introduced for

Whirlpool A whirlpool is a body of rotating water produced by opposing currents or a current running into an obstacle. Small whirlpools form when a bath or a sink is draining. More powerful ones formed in seas or oceans may be called maelstroms ( ). ''Vo ...

and

under the label "Gladiator Garageworks." Homak employed hundreds of people, who enjoyed the prosperity of the industry, and was the largest privately held sheet-metal fabricator in America.

List of Sigmund H. Danziger Jr. lecturers

* 2024-2025.

Emily Wilson (classicist) Emily Rose Caroline Wilson (born 1971) is a British-American classicist, author, translator, and Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2018, Wilson's translation of Homer's ''Odyssey'' became the first by a woman ...

* 2023-2024.

Barbara Graziosi Barbara Graziosi is an Italian classicist and academic. She is Professor (highest academic rank), Professor of Classics at Princeton University. Her interests lie in ancient Greek literature, and the way in which readers make it their own. She h ...

* 2022-2023.

David Wengrow David Wengrow Society of Antiquaries of London, FSA (born 25 July 1972) is a British archaeologist and Professor of Comparative Archaeology at the UCL Institute of Archaeology, Institute of Archaeology, University College London. He co-authored ...

* 2020-2021.

Judith Butler Judith Pamela Butler (born February 24, 1956) is an American feminist philosopher and gender studies scholar whose work has influenced political philosophy, ethics, and the fields of third-wave feminism, queer theory, and literary theory. In ...

* 2019-2020 William Johnson * 2018-2019.

Fiona Macintosh Fiona Macintosh is professor of classical reception at the University of Oxford, director of the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama, curator of the Ioannou Centre, and a Fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford. Career Macintosh gai ...

* 2017-2018

Marina Warner Dame Marina Sarah Warner (born 9 November 1946) is an English historian, mythographer, art critic, novelist and short story writer. She is known for her many non-fiction books relating to feminism and myth. She has written for many publication ...

* 2016-2017.

Simon Schama Sir Simon Michael Schama ( ; born 13 February 1945) is an English historian and television presenter. He specialises in art history, Dutch history, Jewish history, and French history. He is a professor of history and art history at Columbia Uni ...

* 2015–2016

Daniel Boyarin Daniel Boyarin (; born 1946) is an Israeli–American academic and historian of religion. Born in New Jersey, he holds dual United States and Israeli citizenship. He is the Hermann P. and Sophia Taubman Professor of Talmudic Culture in the Dep ...

* 2014–2015

Stephen Greenblatt Stephen Jay Greenblatt (born November 7, 1943) is an American literary historian and author. He has served as the John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University since 2000. Greenblatt is the general editor of ''The Nort ...

* 2013–2014 John T. Hamilton * 2012–2013

Julia Annas Julia Elizabeth Annas (born 1946) is a British philosopher who has taught in the United States for the last quarter-century. She is Regents Professor of Philosophy Emerita at the University of Arizona. Education and career Annas graduated from ...

* 2011–2012.

C. Brian Rose Charles Brian Rose is an American archaeologist, classical scholar, and author. He is the James B. Pritchard Professor of Archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania in the Classical Studies Department and the Graduate Group in the Art and Arch ...

* 2010–2011

Anthony Grafton Anthony Thomas Grafton (born May 21, 1950) is an American historian of early modern Europe and the Henry Putnam University Professor of History at Princeton University, where he is also the Director the Program in European Cultural Studies. He i ...

* 2009–2010 Page DuBois * 2008–2009

Elaine Pagels Elaine Pagels, née Hiesey (born February 13, 1943), is an American historian of religion. She is the Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University. Pagels has conducted extensive research into early Christianity and Gnost ...

* 2007–2008 Mary Beard * 2006–2007

Daniel Mendelsohn Daniel Adam Mendelsohn (born 1960) is an American author, essayist, critic, columnist, and translator. He is currently the Charles Ranlett Flint Professor of Humanities at Bard College, the Editor at Large of the '' New York Review of Books,'' ...

* 2005–2006

Jacques Rancière Jacques Rancière (; ; born 10 June 1940) is a French philosopher, Professor of Philosophy at European Graduate School in Saas-Fee and Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Paris VIII: Vincennes—Saint-Denis. After co-authoring ...

* 2004–2005 Andrew Ford * 2003–2004

Steven Feld Steven Feld (born August 20, 1949) is an American ethnomusicologist, anthropologist, and linguist, who worked for many years with the Kaluli ( Bosavi) people of Papua New Guinea. He earned a MacArthur Fellowship in 1991. Early life Feld was bo ...

* 2002–2003

Josiah Ober Josiah Ober is an American historian of ancient Greece and classical political theorist. He is Tsakopoulos- Kounalakis Professor in honor of Constantine Mitsotakis, and professor of classics and political science, at Stanford University. His t ...

* 2001–2002

Ian Hacking Ian MacDougall Hacking (February 18, 1936 – May 10, 2023) was a Canadian philosopher specializing in the philosophy of science. Throughout his career, he won numerous awards, such as the Killam Prize for the Humanities and the Balzan Prize, ...

* 2000–2001 Simon Goldhill * 1999–2000

David Shulman David Shulman (November 12, 1912 – October 30, 2004) was an American lexicographer and cryptographer. Shulman contributed many early usages to the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' and is listed among "Readers and contributors from collections" for ...

* 1998–1999 Joan E. DeJean * 1997–1998

Mary Poovey Mary Louise Poovey is an American cultural historian and literary critic whose work focuses on the Victorian Era. She is currently Samuel Rudin University Professor in the Humanities at New York University, and Director of the Institute for th ...

* 1996–1997 Peter Brown * 1995–1996 Irene J. Winter * 1994–1995 Charles Segal * 1993–1994

Friedrich Kittler Friedrich Adolf Kittler (June 12, 1943 – October 18, 2011) was a literary scholar and a media theorist. His works relate to Mass media, media, technology, and the military. Biography Friedrich Adolf Kittler was born in 1943 in Rochlitz in S ...

* 1992–1993 Gary A. Tomlinson * 1991–1992

Hazel Carby Hazel Vivian Carby (born 15 January 1948 in Okehampton, Devon) is Professor Emerita of African American Studies and of American Studies. She served as Charles C. and Dorathea S. Dilley Professor of African American Studies and American Studies a ...

* 1990–1991

Naomi Schor Naomi Schor (October 10, 1943 in New York City – December 2, 2001 in New Haven, Connecticut ) was an American literary critic and theorist. A pioneer of feminist theory for her generation, she is regarded as one of the foremost scholars of ...

* 1989–1990

Natalie Zemon Davis Natalie Zemon Davis, (November 8, 1928 – October 21, 2023) was an American-Canadian historian of the early modern period. She was the Henry Charles Lea Professor of History at Princeton University. Her work originally focused on France, but ...

* 1988–1989

Kenneth Dover Sir Kenneth James Dover, (11 March 1920 – 7 March 2010) was a distinguished British classical scholar and academic. He was president of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, from 1976 to 1986. In addition, he was president of the British Academy f ...

References

External links

Official site
{{UChicago University of Chicago, Sigmund H. Danziger Jr. Memorial Lecture in the Humanities University and college lecture series Classical studies 1988 establishments in Illinois Recurring events established in 1988

List of Sigmund H. Danziger Jr. lecturers

See also

References

External links