Strong interest drives venue change for Presidential Lecture with Rick Atkinson

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — The Presidential Lecture Series event next month featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian Rick Atkinson is being moved to the larger Loeb Playhouse in Stewart Center because of strong interest.

The event, titled “America @ 250: Celebrating Freedom’s Giant Leap,” is at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 16, in Loeb. The event is free and open to the general public, but a ticket is still required. For tickets and additional details, go here. Tickets for the original Fowler Hall venue will still be honored at Loeb, so there is no need to reregister.

The Purdue Convocations bag policy will be in effect for the event. A commemorative gift will be given to departing attendees as part of Purdue’s celebration of America’s 250th. Parking ticket validation also will be available for the Grant Street Parking Garage.

This event marks the first moderated by Purdue University President Mitch Daniels since he returned as interim president in July. Daniels launched the lecture series in 2014, his first full year as the university’s president.

Atkinson is the author of the New York Times bestseller “The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777,” the first volume of his acclaimed Revolution Trilogy. The second volume in the planned trilogy, “The Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780,” was a New York Times No. 1 nonfiction bestseller in 2025. The book continued Atkinson’s sweeping narrative of the Revolution, capturing the conflict’s critical middle years with vivid storytelling and deep historical insight.

Previous news release announcing Atkinson’s Presidential Lecture.