10-18-05
Ben Stein to Speak on November 1
Lawyer, Actor, Writer, Economist, Game Show Host, Social Critic
From trial lawyer at the Federal Trade Commission to Nixon speechwriter to playing an iconic economics teacher (“Bueller? Bueller? Bueller? ”) in a hit 80s film, there isn’t much Ben Stein can’t -- or hasn’t -- done.
He hasn’t spoken at Penn State Behrend…yet. That will change Tuesday, Nov. 1, when Stein appears as part of the college’s annual Speaker Series. His lecture begins at 7:30 p.m. in the McGarvey Commons of the Reed Union Building. It is free and open to the public.
Stein graduated from Columbia University in 1966 with honors in economics and from Yale Law School in 1970. He has worked as a poverty lawyer and at the FTC, and has taught law at American University, Pepperdine University, and the University of California at Santa Cruz. For two years in the early 1970s he worked as a White House speechwriter for Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, although his biography is quick to point out that Stein did not pen the line “I am not a crook.”
While he is probably best known for his role in the movie Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (recently ranked as one of the 50 most famous scenes in American film) and as the host of the Emmy-winning Comedy Central quiz show “Win Ben Stein’s Money,” Stein also is an economist and prolific writer. He is a frequent contributor to Barron’s, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Magazine, New York Magazine, The American Spectator, E! Online, and many other publications. Stein has written 16 fiction and nonfiction books; his most recent is the best-selling humorous self-help book How to Ruin Your Financial Health. He also is a regular political commentator on the CBS “Sunday Morning” news program.
More information about Ben Stein can be found at www.benstein.com.
The Speaker Series is sponsored by the Student Activity Fee, the Division of Student Affairs, the Sam and Irene Black School of Business, the Janet Neff Sample Center for Manners and Civility, the School of Science, and the Harriet Behrend Ninow Memorial Lecture Series Fund. It has twice won the National Association for Campus Activities’ Best Lecture Series Award.
For more information about the series, contact Division of Student Affairs at (814) 898-6111.