New York best-selling author James Bradley will speak on campus Tuesday, April 17, at 7:30 p.m. in Kirkland Fine Arts Center.

A professional motivational speaker and writer and producer of corporate films, Bradley is also author of the New York Times No. 1 best-selling book “Flags of Our Fathers,” which was adapted for a Clint Eastwood-directed film in 2007. “Flags of Our Fathers” is about the six men who raised the American flag on Iwo Jima. He also wrote “Flyboys,” a story about eight naval aviators who were beheaded on the island next to Iwo Jima, and “The Imperial Cruise,” an in-depth exploration of Theodore Roosevelt’s foreign policy.

Bradley has lived in more than 40 countries and run companies in the U.S., Japan, the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy. Additionally, he is president of the James Bradley Peace Foundation, which is dedicated to fostering understanding between America and Asia and providing scholarships to American students studying in Japan and China.

Bradley’s appearance is the 2012 T.W. Samuels Lecture. The lecture series was created in 1977 in honor of attorney T.W. Samuels, senior partner in the Decatur law firm of Samuels, Miller, Schroeder, Jackson and Sly. Samuels was active in Decatur community affairs until his death in 1989 at age 103. Samuels’ sons, William J. Samuels of Menlo Park, Calif., and the late Dr. Thomas W. Samuels Jr., created an endowment fund to finance the series in recognition of their father. The endowment is used to bring great thinkers and speakers to Millikin for the purpose of community enrichment.