Bond Street REIT Speaker Series // Lamar Alexander
October 13 @ 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm
In exploring the integrated relationship between culture and democracy, we are honored to welcome special guest Lamar Alexander to join Michael Reynolds for this season’s BOND STREET REIT Series. As a long-serving U.S. Senator, Lamar leaves a legacy spanning politics, education leadership, and public service that has shaped both education policy and, indirectly, public spaces and community programs. As the 5th U.S. Secretary of Education, he championed the “America 2000” initiative and later advanced federal legislation for the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015 and the 2018 Education Next+1, which expanded accountability to improve student outcomes. Lamar Alexander’s career in education leadership—through federal, state, and legislative roles—has had a lasting impact on American schools and public institutions, with indirect benefits to parks and community spaces through infrastructure investment and public service priorities.
About Lamar Alexander
Lamar Alexander has long been known as one of America’s most principled and effective statesmen. As US Senator, Alexander shepherded major laws that today govern K–12 education, medical innovation, and maintenance of our national parks. Former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said, “For eighteen years, there was Lamar Alexander, and there was the rest of us. He was hands-down one of the most brilliant, most thoughtful, and most effective legislators any of us have ever seen.” As governor, Alexander brought the auto industry to Tennessee and made it the first state to pay teachers more for teaching well. He was chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, the nation’s governors, and of President Reagan’s “Commission on Americans Outdoors.” He served as US Education Secretary and as a university president.
Alexander was also known for campaigning in a plaid shirt and performing on the piano with twenty-seven symphonies and on the Grand Ol’ Opry. He graduated from Vanderbilt University and New York University Law School. He and his late wife Honey were married for fifty-four years, had four children and nine grandchildren. His parents were teachers. A seventh generation Tennessean, Alexander lives in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains near Maryville where he grew up. This is his tenth book, all written by the author himself.
About the Bond Street REIT Speaker Series
Orchestrated by Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Michael D. Reynolds, who passionately served as a member of the Board of Trustees and also Treasurer of the Charleston Library Society, the Bond Street REIT Speaker Series strives to honor the institution’s cultural enrichment, intellectual exploration, and literary legacy through a series of lively discussions and thought-provoking lectures. Bond Street is dedicated to preserving the Charleston Library Society’s renowned collection and historical significance, as an immensely valuable repository of history in the South. Bond Street Real Estate Investment Trust, headquartered in Charleston, is a private real estate investment trust uniquely invested in convenience retail centers across ten states in the Southeast.
In 1831, Alexis de Tocqueville toured America and visited Charleston in search of the special ingredient that made America’s democracy so powerful. What he discovered was that the glue that created community and civic discourse was its profoundly thriving cultural institutions. Libraries, theaters, museums, and other cultural spaces served as the foundation for civic engagement and public dialogue. This insight is as relevant today as it was then, and the Library Society remains vibrant because of this very truth.