Friends School Announces Cathleen Lewis ’76 as the 2026 Keynote Commencement Speaker

Friends School is honored to welcome Cathleen Lewis ’76 as the keynote commencement speaker on June 7, 2026.

Cathleen is Curator of International Space Programs and Spacesuits at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum, specializing in Soviet and Russian history. After graduating from Friends School in 1976, Lewis earned both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Russian and Eastern European Studies at Yale University and completed a Ph.D. in history at George Washington University.

As curator, she has collected artifacts that document the history of Soviet and Russian space activities, manages the world’s largest collection of spacesuits, seeks out artifacts and archives that document Black American participation in aviation and spaceflight, and curates the museum’s collections surrounding the efforts to study the impacts of spaceflight on human physiology.

Her most recent book is Cosmonaut: A Cultural History, a study of cosmonaut culture in the last six decades. She has written articles about artifacts in the Smithsonian’s collection and comparing the Soviet and American approaches to exhibiting and portraying spaceflight. Lewis’s current research projects are a general history of the concept of spacesuits and a study of the development of spacesuit gloves.

We look forward to Cathleen’s keynote address and having her back on campus. We invite all families, friends, and alumni to celebrate the Class of 2026’s Commencement on June 7 at 5:30 p.m. on the Middle School lawn. Tickets are not required.