The Messenger Lectures are a series of talks given by scholars and public figures at Cornell University. They were funded in 1924 by a gift from Hiram Messenger of "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". The lecture series has been described as one of Cornell's most important of extracurricular activities.Initially a series of twelve lectures per year, there are now either three or six lectures by one speaker each semester.Archeologist James Henry Breasted delivered the first series of Messenger Lectures in 1925. Source: Wikipedia (en)