Landrum Bolling earned the BA in history from UT in 1933 and the MA from the University of Chicago in 1938. A journalist at the beginning of his career, he was a foreign correspondent with assignments in Rome, Vienna, and Berlin. He served as a war correspondent in World War II, most notably covering the liberation of Sarajevo from Hitler’s occupation army.
He served on the faculties of Beloit College, Brown University, and Earlham College, where he was also president from 1958 to 1973. He was also a research professor at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University (1981–83) and was president and rector of the Tantur Ecumenical Institute in Israel (1983–89). From 1975 to 1977, he served as president of the Lilly Endowment and was chairman of the Council of Foundations from 1978 to 1981. He then began service with Mercy Corps, where he became director at large.
Bolling received more than 30 honorary doctorates from US and international universities. Beginning in the administration of President Jimmy Carter, when direct communication between Washington and the Palestine Liberation Organization was forbidden, he was one of the informal, nonofficial links who delivered messages between the White House and the State Department and Palestinian leaders. The Landrum Bolling Center for Social Sciences and Interdisciplinary Studies at Earlham College recognizes his many contributions to political science and history. At UT he was a varsity debater and won the 1931 Knoxville and East Tennessee oratorical contest sponsored by the Women’s Christian Temperance Union.