Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1978 [PAGE 444]

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APPENDIX Statement, John E. Corbally, President, University of Illinois November 10, 1977 This statement provides a summary of the findings of the University of Illinois concerning the relationship of the University with die so-called M K U L T R A Project sponsored by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) during the 1950's and 1960's. At my request, the C I A provided me with an extensive set of papers related to four research projects which were said to be conducted at the University of Illinois. These papers were censored by the C I A to remove all references to the names of individuals, to institutions other than the University of Illinois, and to locations. For the most part, the papers consisted of fiscal documents — vouchers, requests to forward payments, and the like. U p o n receipt of these papers, I asked Vice President Peter E. Yankwich to work with University records and with appropriate University people to determine, if possible, the specific projects to which these documents referred. Based upon his analysis, I can now report the following : 1. One project was on the Urbana-Champaign ( U I U C ) campus and was funded from January 1, 1960, until about April 1963 by a private funding agency, the Society for the Investigation of H u m a n Ecology ( S I H E ) . It seems clear that the funds in support of diis project came to the University from the C I A through S I H E . It is equally clear that the principal investigator at U I U C was totally unaware — as were all other University officials — of the original source of these funds. As a matter of fact, die principal investigator wrote to the C I A prior to 1960 to determine if there was interest in this project and received no response. T h e project was entitled " T h e Cross-Cultural Generality of Meaning Systems," and, after S I H E funding was dropped, the funding of work in this area at U I U C has continued under National Science Foundation and National Institute of Mental Health auspices. T h e project was not classified in any way and has resulted in a series of major publications available in major journals. It is difficult to understand why the subterfuge was deemed necessary in this situation. This project in the study of language and psycholinguistics was straightforward, open, and noncontroversial. T h e only problem is the pass-through of C I A money to the University — an unnecessary step since the University would have accepted support of this research by the C I A under the same conditions which applied to the supposed support from S I H E . 2. O n e project was on the Medical Center campus and was funded from April 1, 1955, through March 31, 1959, by a private research orga-