Louis R. Harlan
Louis R. Harlan | |
|---|---|
| Born | July 13, 1922 |
| Died | January 22, 2010 |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Johns Hopkins |
| Academic work | |
| Institutions | East Texas State Teachers College, University of Cincinnati, University of Maryland |
Louis Rudolph Harlan (July 13, 1922 – January 22, 2010) was an American academic historian who wrote a two-volume biography of the
Early years
Harlan was born in
invasion of Japan. Over fifty years later, in his 1996 wartime memoir, All at Sea: Coming of Age in World War II, published by University of Illinois Press, he recalled the long-ago conflict and drew historical lessons and parallels for future generations. Discharged in 1945, with the rank of lieutenant, he returned to the study of history, earning an M.A. at Vanderbilt (1948) and a Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins (1955) where, upon hearing a presentation by African-American historian John Hope Franklin, he determined to make race relations in the South his main field of endeavor. At Johns Hopkins, Harlan was a student of C. Vann Woodward.[5]
Career as historian of Booker T. Washington
In 1958, as a white Southerner during the early years of the
University of Maryland, within easy access to the collection of documents left by Booker T. Washington. Over the next two decades, he continued to work on Washington's biography, while also editing, with another Washington historian, Raymond W. Smock
, an edition of Washington's papers, which were published over a fourteen-year period, between 1972 and 1988, ultimately reaching fourteen volumes.
The two volumes of the biography, published eleven years apart, received praise from scholars and historians who referred to Harlan's ability in elucidating Washington's personality which, in Harlan's words, "had vanished into the roles it had played".[6]
During his career Louis R. Harlan also served as president of the
Crohn's Disease, he died in Lexington, Virginia
at the age of 87, and was survived by his wife, Sadie, two sons, Louis and Benjamin, and a grandchild.
Awards
- 1984, Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography for Booker T. Washington, volume 2[3]
- 1973 and 1984,[7] Bancroft Prize, for Booker T. Washington, volumes 1 and 2
- Beveridge Award for his books about Booker T. Washington
Works
- Booker T. Washington: the Making of a Black Leader, 1856–1901. Oxford University Press. 1972.
- Booker T. Washington: the Wizard of Tuskegee, 1901–1915, Volume 2. Oxford. 1983. ISBN 978-0-19-503202-4.
Essays
- Raymond Smock, ed. (2006). Booker T. Washington in Perspective: Essays of Louis R. Harlan. University Press of Mississippi. ISBN 978-1-57806-928-6.
- Harlan, Louis R. "Sympathy and Detachment: Dilemmas of a Biographer." Conspectus of History 1.1 (1974): 29–36
Memoir
- ALL AT SEA: Coming of Age in World War II. University of Illinois Press. 2001. ISBN 978-0-252-07072-3.
References
- ^ Grimes, William. "Louis R. Harlan, Historian of Booker T. Washington, Dies at 87". The New York Times. January 29, 2010.
- ^ Schudel, Matt. "Louis R. Harlan, 87, Pulitzer-winning U-Md. historian was authority on U.S. race relations". The Washington Post. January 29, 2010. With photograph.
- ^ a b "Biography or Autobiography". The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2013-11-26.
- ^ Directory of American Scholars, 6th ed. (Bowker, 1974), Vol. I, p. 261.
- ^ Raymond W. Smock, "In Memoriam: Louis R. Harlan (1922-2010)." Perspectives on History 48, no. 4 (Apr. 2010), accessed July 9, 2021.
- ^ Hunter, Marjorie. "A Pulitzer Biographer's 30-Year Labor of Love". The New York Times. May 10, 1984.
- ISBN 0-911818-71-5.
External links
- Louis R. Harlan at Library of Congress, with 11 library catalog records
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