JOHN B. HARDMAN - TYPED LETTER SIGNED 03/27/1996 - HFSID 270623

[JIMMY CARTER]
TLS: "John B Hardman" as Executive Director, The Carter Center, 1 page, 8½x11. Atlanta, Georgia, 1996 March 27. On letterhead of The Carter Center to comedienne and actress Phyllis Diller. Begins: "Dear Ms. Diller". In full: "I am pleased to send you President Carter's personal report on the second Great Lakes summit completed last week in Tunis. At the request of the leaders of Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zaire, President Carter and the Carter Center have been facilitating a regional peace process beginning with the first summit held in Cairo last November. One of the major achievements of this initiative has been the establishment of a continuous series of discussions among the regional leaders to address the serious problems in Rwanda and Burundi which greatly impact Tanzania, Uganda and Zaire. This process will continue and the Great Lakes leaders will participate in May in the annual CNN World Report, which will focus on regional conflict. Thank you for your ongoing support of The Carter Center which enables us to carry out efforts like the Great Lakes project. Sincerely". Lightly creased. Receipt stamp at upper right, staple holes at upper left blank corner. Fine condition. Accompanied by 21 pages of background materials, including a four-page typed "Trip report" on Carter's March 16-19, 1996 visit to Tunis, a photocopied press release from The Carter Center regarding this second Great Lakes summit, an 11-page photocopy of the "Tunis Declaration on the Great Lakes Region", a photocopied newspaper photograph from the "Atlanta Journal Constitution" depicting Carter with Rwandan President Pasteur Bizimungu, a photocopied article from the "Atlanta Journal Constitution", a two-page photocopied report from CNN World News and a photocopied article titled "Avoiding Anarchy in Burundi" from "The New York Times". All items are lightly creased, some show-through from type on verso (all legible). Stapled together at upper left corners. DR. JOHN D. HARDMAN was appointed Executive Director of The Carter Center, which was founded in 1982, on January 1, 1993. The Medical Director of Peachford Hospital and a member of the Departments of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at Emory University Medical School, Dr. Hartman has also held a number of other prestigious positions, including President of the Georgia Psychiatric Physicians Association, President of the Georgia Council on Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, President and Chairman of Leadership Georgia and Director of the National Association of Private Psychiatric Hospitals. He has also served on the boards of the Mayo Clinic Medical Alumni Association, The Task Force for Child Survival and Development and An International Center for Soil Fertility and Agricultural Development. Comedienne PHYLLIS DILLER (1917-2012), known for her outrageous appearance, zany outfits, distinctive laugh and a stand-up act that featured frequent references to her fictional husband, "Fang", and zingers about her sex appeal and numerous plastic surgeries, got her big break in March 1955 (at age 37), when she debuted at San Francisco's Purple Onion club. A subsequent appearance on The Tonight Show hosted by Jack Paar launched her national career, which got a big boost after Bob Hope saw Diller in a Washington, D.C. club. A favorite of the comedian, Diller would appear in three of Hope's films and 23 of his TV specials. Diller, who recorded her first comedy record album in 1959, took her groundbreaking "funny hausfrau" act to nightclubs and television variety shows and specials and she also appeared on the big screen. Her feature film credits include Splendor in the Grass (1961), The Fat Spy (1966), Boy, Did I Get a Wrong Number! (1966), The Sunshine Boys (1975) and The Silence of the Hams (1994), and she provided the voice of the Queen in A Bug's Life (1998). By 2000, the comedienne, who had trained as a concert pianist before her marriage (1939-1965) to Sherwood Anderson Diller, had appeared as a piano soloist with 100 symphony orchestras across the U.S. Despite retiring from nightclub/stage tours in May 2002 at the age of 84, Diller continued to make films (Motorcross Kids, 2004; Forget About It, 2005) and occasionally appear on TV programs, including two episodes of 7th Heaven (2002, 2003) and a guest shot on The Wayne Brady Show (2004). Eight items.