In 1963 Richard Feynman was invited to give the 1964 Messenger Lectures at Cornell University, an annual tradition since 1924, when Hiram Messenger gifted Cornell with "a fund to provide a course of lectures on the Evolution of Civilization for the special purpose of raising the moral standard of our political, business, and social life", to be "delivered by the ablest non-resident lecturer or lecturers obtainable"
