Renowned Johns Hopkins slavery scholar Willie Lee Rose dies at 91
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Willie Lee Rose, professor emerita of history at Johns Hopkins University and a noted scholar of slavery and the Reconstruction period, died in her sleep on Wednesday at her residence at Roland Park Place in Baltimore. She was 91.
Rose is perhaps best known as the author of Rehearsal for Reconstruction, a book that won several major prizes and that is considered a groundbreaking tome in the scholarly reconsideration of North American slavery. In a review of the book, The New York Times said Rose "has given us what is assuredly a definitive work."
"Willie Lee Rose is among a cadre of historians rightly credited with setting the stage for transformative rethinking of the history of slavery and the Reconstruction era," said Martha S. Jones, professor in the Department of History. "Her 1964 book, republished in 1994, broke important new ground by making the case for how black Americans helped lead the nation into a post-emancipation world. The influence of that book—which explained that even before the Civil War's end, former slaves were at work redefining the nation—can still be felt today in the work of historians, including myself, who argue that story of emancipation and reconstruction extend back to the early 19th century. It's worth noting that Rose became a historian in a period during which women in the profession were rare."
In addition to her many publications, Rose wrote occasional reviews of historical books for The New York Review of Books.
A native of Bedford, Virginia, Rose graduated from Mary Washington College and went on to teach high school in Elkridge, Maryland, from 1947 to 1949, when she married William G. Rose. She continued to teach until 1955, when she began to pursue graduate studies at Johns Hopkins University. ...