May 2012 Luncheon Meeting

Speaker:  Paul Ruxin

“The Club: Exclusive, Historic and (Seemingly) Perpetual” 

Caxtonian Paul Ruxin will talk about The Club. In 1764, a truly distinguished group of English gentlemen organized The Club, chiefly to create a forum in which Samuel Johnson's conversational skills would be put on display, for his own entertainment as well as theirs. Through the years, members (never more than 40), have included Joshua Renyolds, James Boswell, David Garick, Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, William Gladstone, Matthew Arnold, Thomas Huxley, Rudyard Kipling, and multiples of Archbishops of Canterbury and prime ministers. What of those blackballed? What of the the Club today? All part of the story!

An attorney for 41 years, including Chairman (for 25 years) of Jones Day's specialized energy industry practice, Paul Ruxin serves as Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC and has a personal collection of the works of Samuel Johnson and James Boswell that is among the most complete private collections in the world.

 Luncheon buffet (in the main dining room on
six) opens at 11:30 am.  Program (in a different room, to be announced) from 12:30-1:30