By DEB NIELSEN
Alumni News staff
It has been 391 years since European settlers first made a go of it in the New World. In nine years, Virginians will lead the nation and the world in celebrating the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown in what is now Virginia.
And University of Nebraska alumnus Norm Beatty is at the center of it all.
“The uniqueness of our nation that really began here is the story we have to tell,” Beatty said from his office at the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation in Williamsburg, Va.
Beatty, who graduated from NU in 1963 with a bachelor’s degree in journalism, directs the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, which the Virginia General Assembly charged with planning Celebration 2007.
Beatty has been involved in Virginia history since early in his public relations career. In 1966, Colonial Williamsburg, a non-profit educational foundation responsible for the restoration of the settlement of the same name, hired Beatty as manager of radio and television. He wrote television and radio scripts for the foundation.
By the time he took early retirement in 1995 to start his own public relations firm, Beatty Communications, he had worked his way up to being vice president for government and community relations at Colonial Williamsburg.
He gave up Beatty Communications to take the position of director of Celebration 2007 in November 1997. Beatty’s wife, Katharine, said her husband’s decision to take the job was easy.
“It was a ready-made job for him,” she said.
She said Beatty was a great patriot who enjoyed history and was proud of his experience in planning other major events while he worked at Colonial Williamsburg.
Norm Beatty is no stranger to planning and directing major events. He was in charge of planning such high-profile Williamsburg events as the 1983 Summit of Industrialized Nations, which was hosted by President Ronald Reagan, the First Amendment Freedom Summit in 1985, the NATO Defense Ministerial and the Defense Ministerial of the Americas in 1995, several U.S. presidential visits and visits of more than 25 foreign heads or chiefs of state.
As director of Celebration 2007, Beatty is now charged with coordinating the plans for the quadracentennial of Jamestown’s founding.
Planning for the celebration has begun, Beatty said, with the goal of submitting a master plan to the governor of Virginia and the Virginia General Assembly in January 2000. The foundation held round table discussions throughout the state to collect ideas and suggestions from a cross section of Virginia citizens, Beatty said. Committees are putting those ideas together to reach a plan.
“The sky is open right now,” he said.
Virginia historian Nancy Egloff said Americans had celebrated anniversaries of the Jamestown settlement several times in the past. The years 1807, 1822, 1857, 1907 and 1957 provided opportunities for celebration. Past celebrations have included a military parade, a speech by President John Tyler and a visit from England’s Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip.
The 300th anniversary celebration in 1907 was the biggest, Beatty said. Egloff said President Theodore Roosevelt opened the celebration, which covered 340 acres and featured war vessels from all over the world.
Beatty said the 1907 event was like a world’s fair lasting eight months. He said he didn’t expect the coming celebration to be like a world’s fair, but he did expect it to be of international scope.
“We hope to get international interest and attention as much as they did in 1907,” he said.
He said the celebration would be a great opportunity for all Americans to celebrate the country’s beginnings.
Beatty said he enjoyed directing the planning for Celebration 2007.
“It’s a labor of love. It’s a great story to be told,” he said.
Beatty, who will be 67 when the event is over, said Celebration 2007 would be a good way to celebrate his years in public relations and special events.
“It’s certainly going to be the culmination of my career,” he said.
Alumni
Spotlight