Hodding Carter was the University Professor of Leadership and Public Policy. He was chair of the University of North Carolina Press Development Council, a member of the Faculty’s Honorary Degrees Committee, a member of the Carolina Performing Arts Advisory Committee, a member of the Thomas W. Lambeth Lecture Committee, and was involved in several Center for the Study of the American South projects and programs.

Prior to joining the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Dr. Carter was president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, where he worked with former UNC System President Bill Friday ’48, LLB, who was chair of the foundation’s commission on intercollegiate athletics. Dr. Carter also worked for about eighteen years as a reporter and editor for the Delta Democrat-Times of Greenville, MS, which was owned by his father. Ferrel Guillory described them as “crusading Southern journalists.” As an editorialist, Carter strongly promoted the presidential candidacy of Terry Sanford ’39. He later worked on the presidential campaigns of Lyndon Johnson and Jimmy Carter.

Nationally, Hodding Carter is perhaps best remembered as the spokesman for the U.S. State Department during the Iran hostage crisis in the late 1970s. Dr. Carter’s wife, Patt Derian, also worked in the Carter administration’s human rights initiatives in other countries.

Dr. Carter later was a correspondent for the PBS Frontline documentary series and wrote as a contributor for major U.S. newspapers. He is a four-time Emmy winner and recipient of the Edward R. Murrow Award for broadcast journalism.