The Honorable Carl Spielvogel and Mrs. Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel
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April 2021 - The Diplomacy Center Foundation Remembers Ambassador Carl Spielvogel. Learn More
April 2021 - Dr. Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel Joins the DCF Board of Directors. Learn More
Biography of Carl Spielvogel
Ambassador Carl Spielvogel served as the US ambassador to the Slovak Republic from 2000 to 2001. For his outstanding service to Slovakia, President Rudolf Schuster presented him with the Presidential Medal of Honor of Slovakia.
Ambassador Spielvogel had over 35 years of experience in the world of international trade, doing business in 55 countries. He served as chairman and chief executive officer of three of the world's largest global marketing and communications companies, including Backer Spielvogel Bates Worldwide, Inc. He also served as vice chairman and a member of the Board of Directors of the Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc. From 1994 to 1997, he was chairman and chief executive officer of the United Auto Group, Inc. At that time, it was the nation's largest publicly owned auto dealership group and one of the first automobile dealership groups to go public on the New York Stock Exchange.
Ambassador Spielvogel began his working career as a copy boy in the news department, then a reporter, and a six-times-a-week columnist for The New York Times. He was chairman of the International Advisory Board of The Financial Times. He was a fellow at The Center for Business and Government at The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, a member of the Executive Committee and The Board of Trustees of The Asia Society, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a member of the Council for the Study of Europe at Columbia University.
In 1995, Ambassador Spielvogel was appointed by President William J. Clinton and approved by the US Senate to serve on the US Broadcasting Board of Governors, which is responsible for Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, and all other non-military broadcast media of the US government.
Ambassador Spielvogel was deeply involved in cultural affairs. He has been a board member of the following organizations: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, and The Asia Society. He also served for 20 years as a trustee of Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York and Eureka Communities, which works to rebuild inner cities.
A native of New York City, Ambassador Spielvogel held a bachelor of business administration degree and an honorary doctor of laws degree from Baruch College of The City University of New York. In 1990, he was the recipient of Baruch's Distinguished Alumnus Award for outstanding career accomplishment. In 2003, he set up the Colin Powell Fellowship Program at Baruch College to encourage outstanding graduates to seek career opportunities at the US Department of State. He is also a member of the executive committee and board of trustees of the State University of New York (SUNY)—the nation’s largest state university system in the US, comprised of 65 college campuses with approximately 600,000 students.
He was married to Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, author of eighteen books on art, architecture, and public policy.
Biography of Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel
Dr. Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel was the first director of Cultural Affairs in New York City. She is the author of 24 books on culture, arts, urban, and preservation issues. She has served as the curator of eight international traveling museum exhibitions. She was the producer and interviewer for seven television series about the arts, architecture, design, crafts, and public policy for the Arts & Entertainment Network and other programs for national networks, including CBS and NBC. Her television interviews are now available on YouTube, having been digitized by the Diamonstein-Spielvogel Video Archives at Duke University.
President Ronald Reagan appointed Dr. Diamonstein-Speilvogel to the board of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) where she served as chair of the sub-committee of USHMM that commissioned their Art for the Public Spaces program. In 1996, President William J. Clinton appointed her to the US Commission of Fine Arts (CFA). In 2002, she was the first woman to be elected as vice chair of the CFA in its century-long history.
In 2001, Dr. Diamonstein-Spielvogel was the first woman elected as an honorary member of PEN-Slovakia. In 2003, she received the Gen. Milan R. Stefanik Award for contributing to the advancement of public knowledge about the Slovak nation and people. In 2004, The Slovak Republic's Ministry of Foreign Affairs decorated her for “her remarkable personal contribution to the development of a civil society in Slovakia.” In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed her to the American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC), which oversees the design, construction, and maintenance of the US military memorials throughout the world. With ABMC, she chaired the New Memorials Committee. In July 2013, she was named to lead the ABMC delegation to Busan, Korea. She was the keynote speaker at the ceremonies commemorating the 60th anniversary of the armistice of the Korean War, which was attended by leaders and veterans of 21 participating nations. In 2018, she was appointed to the newly formed American Battle Monuments Foundation.
Appointed to the New York State Council for the Arts in 2007, Dr. Diamonstein-Spielvogel served as vice chair from 2013 to 2016. In 2016, she was appointed chair and CEO by Governor Andrew Cuomo, serving in that capacity until 2018. She was the longest-serving member of the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission, spanning four mayoral administrations from 1972 to 1987. She then served as chair of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Foundation from 1987 to 1995 where she created and underwrote the placement of Historic District street signs, descriptive markers, and maps in each of New York City's then 84 Historic Districts. The program has since become a model for similar initiatives throughout the United States. Dr. Diamonstein-Spielvogel has been the chair of The Historic Landmarks Preservation Center since 1995.
In addition to her extensive public service, Dr. Diamonstein-Spielvogel is the recipient of numerous honors and awards and is the founder and chair of the NYC Landmarks50+ Alliance—a consortium of more than 189 organizations representing the literary, visual, and performing arts, business, medicine, science, architecture, and preservation that convened to commemorate and honor the significant anniversary of the passage of the NYC Landmarks Law in 1965.