Revilo P. Oliver
Revilo P. Oliver | |
---|---|
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | |
Subject | American conservatism, politics, anti-communism, White nationalism, religion, antisemitism, Holocaust denial |
Spouse | Grace Needham |
Revilo Pendleton Oliver (July 7, 1908 – August 20, 1994) was an American professor of
Oliver attracted national notoriety in the 1960s when he published an article after the President
Life and career
Early life
Oliver was born in 1908 near
]He later wrote that as an adolescent, he found amusement in watching evangelists "pitch the woo at the simple-minded", attending performances of Aimee Semple McPherson and Katherine Tingley.[5] He entered Pomona College in Claremont, California, when he was sixteen.[6]
Academia
In 1930, Oliver married Grace Needham. He returned to Illinois, where he attended the
Oliver began teaching graduate classes. For a number of years[specify] he also gave graduate courses in the Renaissance, teaching in the Departments of Spanish and Italian.[6] He said he read 11 languages.[3]
Oliver worked in a military intelligence unit in the Signal Services during World War II, according to his writing.[3] He wrote that he was in the War Department from 1942 until autumn 1945, and that he was "responsible for the work of c. 175 persons".[6][third-party source needed]
Oliver left Washington, D.C. in 1945. He joined the University of Illinois in 1945[3] as an Assistant Professor, became an Associate Professor in 1947, and Professor in 1953.[8] He published little in the academic press but later became known for politically conservative articles expressing anti-Semitism and white nationalism.[citation needed] He retired in 1977 from the University of Illinois as a professor emeritus.[3]
Conservative movement
Oliver co-founded the
In 1958, Oliver joined as a founding member of
After the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Oliver wrote a two-part article called "Marxmanship in Dallas" published in March 1964 in American Opinion, the Birch magazine. It alleged that Lee Harvey Oswald had carried out the murder as part of a communist conspiracy to kill Kennedy, whom Oliver described as a puppet who had outlived his usefulness.[12][14] In March 1964, Oliver was reprimanded by the University of Illinois' Board of Trustees, but was allowed to keep his position.[15] Oliver testified in the fall of that year before the Warren Commission.[4]
White nationalism
In 1966, Oliver embarrassed Welch by proclaiming that the world's troubles would be ended if "all Jews were vaporized at dawn tomorrow" along with "Illuminati" and "Bolsheviks".
Oliver subsequently became involved with Willis Carto's National Youth Alliance (NYA).[2] Oliver mentored William Luther Pierce, founder of the National Alliance and author of The Turner Diaries. He also mentored the neo-Nazi activist Kevin Alfred Strom.[3] "Oliver's writings on Jews and race-mixing became an important part of neo-Nazi culture in the early twenty-first century," according to Andrew S. Winston of the University of Guelph.[3]
In 1978, Oliver became an editorial adviser for the Institute for Historical Review, an organization devoted primarily to Holocaust denial.[2] He was also a regular contributor to Liberty Bell, an antisemitic magazine.[3]
Although originally a proponent that Christianity is essential to Western civilization, Oliver became convinced that Christianity, by promoting universality and brotherhood rather than racial survival, was itself a Jewish product and part of the conspiracy.[3][18] In a 1990 article, he characterized Christianity as "a spiritual syphilis" that "has rotted the minds of our race and induced paralysis of our will to live".[19] Damon T. Berry, in his book Blood and Faith: Christianity and American White Nationalism (Syracuse University Press, 2017), devotes a chapter to Oliver, concluding that "Oliver hated both conservativism and Christianity ... because they equally represented to him an ideological poison that was alien to the best instincts of the white race to defend its existence."[18]
Later years and death
In 1994, suffering from leukemia and severe emphysema, he committed suicide at the age of 86 in Urbana, Illinois. His estate arranged to publish several works posthumously through Historical Review Press and Liberty Bell, as well as to attend to the needs of his wife Grace in her declining years.[citation needed]
Name and pseudonyms
"Revilo P. Oliver" is a palindrome—a phrase that reads the same backwards and forwards. Oliver wrote that his name had been given to first sons in his family for six generations.[20]
He used the pen names "Ralph Perier" (for The Jews Love Christianity and Religion and Race) and "Paul Knutson" (for Aryan Asses). Oliver is sometimes credited as the author of the Introduction (credited to Willis Carto) to Francis Parker Yockey's Imperium.[citation needed]
Books
- The Little Clay Cart. Urbana: University of Illinois Press (1938).
- Niccolò Perotti's Translations of the Enchiridion. University of Illinois Press (1940).
- History and Biology. Griff Press (1963).
- All America Must Know the Terror that Is Upon Us. Bakersfield: Conservative Viewpoint (1966); Liberty Bell Publications (1975).
- Conspiracy or Degeneracy?. Power Products (1967).
- Christianity and the Survival of the West. Sterling, VA: Sterling Enterprises (1973).
- Reprinted, with new postscript: Cape Canaveral: Howard Allen (1978). ISBN 978-0914576129.
- Reprinted, with new postscript: Cape Canaveral: Howard Allen (1978).
- The Jews Love Christianity. Liberty Bell Publications (1980). Published under the pseudonym "Ralph Perrier."
- America's Decline: The Education of a Conservative. London: Londinium Press (1981).
- ISBN 0906879655.
- The Enemy of Our Enemies. Liberty Bell Publications (1981).
- "Populism" and "Elitism". Liberty Bell Publications (1982). ISBN 978-0942094015.
- Christianity Today: Four Articles. Liberty Bell Publications (1987). OCLC 166141772.
- ISBN 0942094115.
Published posthumously
- The Origins of Christianity. Historical Review Press(1994).
- Reflections on the Christ Myth. Historical Review Press(1994).
- The Origins of Christianity Historical Review Press(2001).
- The Jewish Strategy Palladian Books (2002).
- Against the Grain. Liberty Bell Publications (2004).[third-party source needed]
References
- ^ a b c "Prof. Oliver, Known for Strong Anti-jewish Views, Quits Birch Society". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. August 17, 1966. Retrieved April 9, 2022.
- ^ S2CID 153984405.
- ^ S2CID 239725899– via Gale.
- ^ a b Warren Commission Hearings, vol. XV, November 1964, p. 709
- ^ a b Oliver, Revilo P. (2002), The Jewish Strategy, Earlysville, Virginia: Kevin Alfred Strom, p. v
- ^ a b c d Oliver 2002, p. vi.
- S2CID 163193290
- ^ Oliver 2002, p. vi-vii.
- ^ Buckley, William F. Jr. (November 19, 1955), "Our Mission Statement", National Review, archived from the original on March 2, 2008
- ^ JSTOR 3663045.
- ^ Gordon, David (April 1992), "In Search of Buckley's 'Hypersensitivity to Anti-Semitism'", The Rothbard-Rockwell Report, vol. III, no. 4, p. 4
- ^ a b "KENNEDY TARGET OF BIRCH WRITER; Article Says He Was Killed for Fumbling Red Plot". The New York Times. Retrieved July 2, 2021.
- ^ Buckley, William F. Jr. (March 2008), "Goldwater, the John Birch Society, and Me", Commentary, archived from the original on March 8, 2008, retrieved March 9, 2008
- ^ Oliver, Revilo P. (February 1964). "Marxmanship in Dallas". American Opinion. Retrieved September 1, 2006.
- ^ "Professor Censured for Attack on Kennedy", Los Angeles Times, p. 11, March 19, 1964
- ^ Connor, Claire (2013), Wrapped in the Flag: A Personal History of America's Radical Right, Beacon Press, pp. 40–43, 99, 191, and ch. 6, footnote #11
- )
- ^ )
- ^ Oliver, Revilo P. (November 1990), "A Cringing Lord", Liberty Bell, retrieved September 1, 2006
- ^ Oliver 2002, p. v: "My first name, an obvious palindrome, has been the burden of the eldest or only son for six generations."
External links
- Revilo-Oliver.com Archive
- Revilo P. Oliver at the Database of Classical Scholars
- Works by Revilo P. Oliver, at JSTOR