Most surprise parties end with cake. For Sidley Austin legend and former FCC and PBS chairman Newton Minow, a surprise reception recently revealed an endowed professorship created in his name at Northwestern Law School. His friends, fellow alumni, and colleagues donated $4M to start the professorship and a debate association. Here's Newt at the center of the celebration, surrounded by Chuck Douglas (BA '70), Mark Angelson, Carter Phillips (MA ’75, JD '77), and Howard Trienens (BBA ’45, JD ’49).

Newt graduated from Northwestern's law school in '50 and clerked for Supreme Court Chief Justice Fred Vinson. About a decade later, President Kennedy appointed Newt chairman of the FCC, where he helped expand the broadcast spectrum and promote satellite technology (also making the famed TV as a "vast wasteland" speech). Later Newt and fellow Northwestern grads Dick Wiley and Henry Geller reintroduced televised Presidential debates. (He co-chaired them in '76 and '80.) To top off the impact Newt's had on the country, at Sidley Austin he hired a young summer associate named Barack Obama.