As Salzburg Global's 75th anniversary year has come to an end, we reflect on a year of extraordinary achievements
Anniversaries are important. They remind us how far we have come, and they give us an opportunity to reimagine the future. They are moments to be celebrated as important historic milestones. And they are chances to chart a new course and invest in the future. In short, anniversaries allow us to reflect on the past and recommit to a vision that will shape the decades to come.
This July, as we mark the official conclusion of Salzburg Global Seminar’s 75th anniversary, we wanted to share our reflections on this extraordinary anniversary year with our Fellows, friends, and supporters, and to celebrate our achievements together as we look ahead to the next 75 years.
This anniversary – Salzburg Global’s 75th – has been a transformational one. Without exaggeration, this anniversary year has been perhaps the single most transformational year in the long history of this extraordinary institution.
This is a bold claim to be sure. However, in reflecting on all that we have accomplished during our 75th anniversary year – from celebrating our history, to engaging and supporting our Fellows, navigating a successful leadership transition, and investing for the future – we think you will agree that Salzburg Global at 75 has never looked better and our future has never looked brighter.
Schloss Leopoldskron: Past and Present: To officially inaugurate our anniversary year, we published the most complete history of Schloss Leopoldskron and Salzburg Global Seminar to date. From the construction of Schloss Leopoldskron in 1736, to the Max Reinhardt era and his establishment of the Salzburg Festival, to the founding and evolution of Salzburg Global Seminar, this commemorative book includes research-based essays, photographs, and archival material that provide a journey through the unique history of Schloss Leopoldskron and Salzburg Global Seminar.
75th Anniversary Vignettes: With 75 years of incredible stories about the visionary people and ideas that have helped shape a better world since 1947, for our 75th anniversary, we published a series of 12 historic vignettes. These vignettes, written by former Resident Director, Timothy Ryback, explore the symbiosis of visionary enterprise, extraordinary people, and the magic of Salzburg Global Seminar and Schloss Leopoldskron.
Harvard University Opens New Salzburg Global Exhibit: This major exhibition of our archives, never before made available to the public, tells the story of Salzburg Global Seminar’s evolution, identity, and historic commitment to bridging divides and shaping a better world. The exhibition, A Marshall Plan of the Mind: 75 Years of Salzburg Global Seminar, was held at the Pusey Library at Harvard University from November 2022 to March 2023 and featured a range of archival materials, including letters from the post-war period describing the need for exchange and the importance of the early mission and vision of our founders.
Providing Refuge at Schloss Leopoldskron: Just as we did after our founding from 1947-1949, during our 75th anniversary year, Salzburg Global Seminar opened the doors of Schloss Leopoldskron to Fellows fleeing war in conflict. When Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine started in February, Salzburg Global opened its doors to offer refuge to our Ukrainian Fellows, their friends, and families. Not long after, to support Ukrainian Civil Society leaders and their organizations, we initiated the Ukraine Civil Society Forum, which continues to support Ukrainian Civil Society in partnership with the United States Institute for Peace and the 21st Century Trust.
Re-curating Schloss Leopoldskron: A Celebration of our Fellows and their Creative Practice: Throughout its history, Schloss Leopoldskron has been inextricably linked to cycles of power, persecution, and renewal. Despite difficult and sometimes dark periods in the history of Schloss Leopoldskron, the cycles of renewal – through vision, enterprise, and cultural and social leadership – have provided a space for creativity, inclusion, and inspiration for people from all over the world. For our 75th anniversary, we began the process of re-curating our historic spaces to better represent our values, serve our mission, and ensure our historic spaces are inclusive for all our Fellows and guests from around the world. During this year, we have re-designed and re-curated several important public spaces by investing in exhibition infrastructure, exhibiting new artistic works reflective of our global Fellowship, and developing new signage, educational materials, and curatorial projects in Schloss Leopoldskron to examine and understand its complicated and contested histories.
Examples of these exhibitions include:
Launch of Fellows’ Mobilize Community: For our 75th Anniversary, our Salzburg Global Fellowship Community was moved to Mobilize, a platform designed to build online communities, connect with other Salzburg Global Fellows, share opportunities, engage in our programs, and receive updates from Salzburg Global and our 40,000 Fellows around the world. If you haven’t joined yet, find out more here: Mobilize!
Salzburg Global Seminar’s 75th anniversary also included a changing of the guard. Stephen Salyer, our President and CEO from 2005 to 2022, stepped down on July 31, 2022. And on August 1, 2022, Martin Weiss became our first Austrian President and CEO, stepping down as Austrian Ambassador to the United States to take over the reins.Leadership transitions can sometimes be delicate and disruptive, but the transition from Stephen Salyer to Martin Weiss was truly an inspired one.
Stephen Salyer departed Salzburg Global as the longest serving CEO in Salzburg Global’s history. Since 2005, Stephen’s leadership and focus on non-profit innovation steered Salzburg Global through two major global crises—the financial crisis of 2008 and the COVID-19 crisis—while at the same time expanding our programs and impact, enhancing and diversifying our board and governance functions, increasing our endowment, and investing more than $10 million in Salzburg Global’s historic facilities. Under Stephen's tenure, we created a social enterprise hospitality business, Hotel Schloss Leopoldskron, and successfully completed the largest fundraising campaign in our history, dramatically improving our financial sustainability. As Stephen said when launching our anniversary celebrations, as “we celebrate 75 years, we celebrate a timeless place like no other, a place where in-formed by the past and by enduring principles, the future will unfold, and where a new generation will strive to shape a better world.” If the measure of success is leaving some-thing in better shape than you found it, Stephen’s tenure as CEO was surely one of the most successful in our history.
Since joining Salzburg Global Seminar on August 1, Martin Weiss has extended that leg-acy and has already made quite a mark on this extraordinary institution. During his first year, Martin led the development of new and expanded partnerships with the Kellogg Foundation, The Nippon Foundation, and the Korea Foundation for Advanced Studies. He has reinvigorated our Austrian partnerships and collaborations, including with the Salzburg Festival, the Land and City of Salzburg, the University of Salzburg, and the Diplomatic Academy in Vienna. He has also initiated a new brand development and strategy process to upgrade Salzburg Global’s iconic brand for the next 75 years. Finally, to conclude our 75th anniversary year, Martin announced the largest single gift to Salzburg Global Seminar in our history, an $11 million contribution from our Chair, Victoria Mars. The only question now is what Martin will do for his second year as CEO!
While anniversaries are important for the history they celebrate, they are more important for the future that they make possible. During our 75th anniversary year, we set out to ensure that this year will be remembered for the major investments we made in Salzburg Global’s future.
We succeeded beyond our wildest expectations.
Successful Completion of our Inspiring Leadership Campaign: At the start of our 75th anniversary we announced the completion of the largest fundraising campaign in our history, with $18.3m in funds raised. The success of this ambitious campaign enables us to invest in our programs, people, and place, and sustain future generations of groundbreaking programs, leadership development, and historic home of Schloss Leopoldskron. These investments included:
The Launch of our Salzburg Global Center for Education Transformation: Launched on World Teacher’s Day in 2022, and made possible by our Inspiring Leadership Campaign, our Education Center focuses on influencing systems transformation efforts by developing new approaches to critical and emerging issues, including social, emotional, and creative skills, education in emergencies, regenerative education, language of instruction, education leadership and inclusive futures.
Achieving Carbon Neutrality in Schloss Leopoldskron and the Meierhof: In 2017, during our 70th anniversary, we began the process of moving our facilities toward carbon neutrality by removing the existing oil heating system in Schloss Leopoldskron and connecting to the district heating system of Salzburg, which relies primarily on renewables and is committed to carbon neutrality by 2050. For our 75th anniversary, and with support from the Packard Foundation, we removed the natural gas heating system in the Meierhof Building, which includes 18 offices, 55 hotel rooms, 4 apartments, 5 staff housing units, a café, two conference rooms, and a large reception area and library. With Packard’s support, as well as with support from generous individual donors, we are now installing air-heat pumps as well as solar panels (in 2024) to provide zero-emission heating (and eventually cooling) of the Meierhof. Together, these investments are enabling us to achieve a significant priority for Salzburg Global Seminar’s 75th anniversary: transitioning our facilities to carbon neutrality and achieving zero carbon-emitting infrastructure.
The Initiation of the First Ever “Masterplan” for Schloss Leopoldskron: During our 75th anniversary year and following more than ten years of major investments and numerous renovation projects in Schloss Leopoldskron and the Meierhof, including the new Fellows Hall and the new Gallery, with the support of Salzburg’s Historic Preservation Agency (Bundesdenkmalamt), we initiated an extensive facilities masterplan process. This is the first time in Schloss Leopoldskron’s 280-year history that a long-term masterplan is being developed. Once completed, the masterplan process will create a long-term vision for our historic property, including Schloss Leopoldskron and the Meierhof, ensure that the mission and purpose of Salzburg Global is central to long-term planning, ensure the long-term preservation and sustainability of Schloss Leopoldskron and the Meierhof while enabling short-term progress on key renovation priorities, and produce a “Conservation Management Plan” for each room of Schloss Leopoldskron, including detailed information on the condition, recommended preservation and restoration measures, and restoration costs.
The Renovation of our Historic Gardens and Mansbach Parterre: In June 2022, after two years of restoration, the "Mansbach Garden Parterre" was officially opened. With support from our Board Member, Tom Mansbach, the main historic gardens between Schloss Leopoldskron and the lake (the Garden Parterre) were beautifully and carefully restored by the Royal Garden Academy in Berlin. The Royal Academy reviewed archival images and historic garden plans from the time of Max Reinhardt to develop a parterre that reflects the unique beauty of Schloss Leopoldskron but is also intended to be used as a space for reflection, engagement, and creativity. The Mansbach Garden Parterre now blooms throughout the year with more than 1000 different bushes, plants, and flowers that symbolize and represent the diversity of Fellows, languages, and cultures that are part of our programs.
The Renovation of the Red Salon: With leadership support from former US Ambassador to Austria, Trevor Traina, as well as numerous other former US Ambassadors and friends of Salzburg Global Seminar, Max Reinhardt’s Red Salon was renovated and restored for our 75th anniversary and for the 150th anniversary of Max Reinhardt’s birth (September 9,1873). The restoration of the Red Salon was implemented by renowned interior designer Ken Fulk and was intended to reflect the legacy and spirit of Max Reinhardt. Using elements from the original baroque stucco ceiling, historic tapestries once used by Reinhardt as backdrop for theatre productions, and the inspiration of Reinhardt’s influence on the evolution of the theatre, the Red Salon now displays the confluence of these elements, using the concept of creative renewal and artistic collaboration to inspire a Red Salon for the 21st century.
The Largest Gift in Salzburg Global’s History – Pathways to Peace: Finally, on June 30, one year after starting our official 75th anniversary celebrations, we announced a historic gift of $11 million from our Chair, Victoria Mars, to advance our mission and impact and to launch a new “Pathways to Peace Initiative". This gift, the largest in our history, will enable us to make a sustained and lasting contribution to new thinking and ideas that enable pathways to peace – a mission that has been at the heart of Salzburg Global’s purpose since 1947. Most importantly, this gift, which will support and grow our program endowment, will ensure we can continue this important mission for the next 75 years and beyond.
As we look back on this anniversary year and officially conclude our 75th anniversary celebrations, we can truly say that the future of Salzburg Global has never looked brighter. At 75, we completed the largest fundraising campaign in our history, announced the largest single gift in our history, expanded our programs, found new ways to support and engage our Fellows, bid farewell to our longest serving CEO and welcomed our first Austrian CEO, and made significant new investments in our people, our place, and our programs.
Most importantly, with this extraordinary anniversary year now behind us and as we look ahead to the next 75 years, we are reminded of all the people - staff, Fellows, directors, friends, and supporters - that have been stewards of this extraordinary institution for so long and that have worked tirelessly to build strong foundations for the future. It is only because of the tireless and extraordinary work of those who committed themselves to the evolution of Salzburg Global Seminar over so many years that we were able to celebrate a 75th anniversary like this one.
Now, on to the next 75 years!