One of George Washington Carver’s greatest admirers will be visiting Iowa State during Veishea to learn more about Carver’s time at the university.

Peter Burchard, author of “Carver, A Great Soul,” has visited every place Carver lived except ISU. He will arrive in Ames Thursday to see where Carver received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees.

He also will be visiting Winterset and Indianola, but most of his time in Iowa will be spent at ISU, where he plans to take part in several Veishea events.

“Iowa State’s my main spot,” he said.

Many events have been scheduled for Burchard’s visit.

He will be one of the speakers Thursday at the dedication ceremony for the George Washington Carver statue at 11 a.m. north of Carver Hall. Burchard also will participate in the Veishea opening ceremonies Friday by giving a speech titled “The Visionary George Washington Carver” at 5 p.m.

On Saturday, Burchard will be the keynote speaker for a multimedia presentation to discuss Carver’s effects on agriculture at 3 p.m. in the Pioneer Room of the Memorial Union.

Harold McNabb, professor of plant pathology and forestry, said he and his class will be part of the multimedia presentation.

McNabb said he suggested to Pat Miller, director of the Committee on Lectures, to have Burchard speak during Veishea because this was an “opportune time” for Burchard to come to ISU.

As part of Burchard’s presentations, he will play a film with actual recordings of Carver’s voice. He said he was able to get the film through the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, where Carver’s record collection is kept.

Burchard said most people are interested in Carver because of what he did for science, but he is interested in the spiritual side of Carver.

“I’ve been interested in Carver all of my life,” he said.

“Carver, A Great Soul” is an introductory book about Carver that took 12 years to complete. To conduct research for the book, Burchard said he went through about 87,000 of Carver’s papers and was “practically living with Dr. Carver.”

Midwest Book Review and other publications have given the book good reviews, he said.

Burchard currently is working on a second book about Carver. He recently finished a chapter on ISU and is about halfway done with the book, he said.

While visiting ISU, Burchard will continue his research on Carver by looking at photos on microfilm at Parks Library.