obituaries

• SOURCE: The Guardian
  2/23/2021
  

  Lawrence Ferlinghetti Obituary

  Lawrence Ferlinghetti's influence lasted long past the Beat Generation (of which he was perhaps the last survivor) through his ownership of the landmark independent City Lights bookstore in San Francisco.

• 
• SOURCE: Radical History Review
  2/19/2021
  

  His Ignominy Is His Triumph: a Counter-Obituary of Rush Limbaugh

  by A.J. Bauer

  "You’d be hard pressed to find a better popularizer of the concept of counter-hegemonic struggle (“culture war” in the vernacular), albeit on the right, or a more “organic intellectual” of the U.S. white upper middle class."

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  2/14/2021
  

  James Ridgeway, Hard-Hitting Investigative Journalist, Dies at 84

  The journalist James Ridgeway exposed malfeasance by corporate polluters and politicians, but dedicated his greatest energy to his last crusade, to end the practice of solitary confinement in prisons. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  2/8/2021
  

  Robert L. Herbert, 91, Dies; Saw Impressionism With a Fresh Eye

  Robert Herbert's studies of impressionism revitalized the field by situating the work of artists in the context of theri social lives. 

• 
• SOURCE: ESPN
  1/22/2021
  

  Hank Aaron's Lasting Impact is Measured in More than Home Runs

  by Howard Bryant

  Hank Aaron biographer Howard Bryant shared common experiences with the baseball legend as a Black man in the sports industry. He writes about the legacy of the slugger who lived through the Jim Crow and civil rights eras and died at age 86 today. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  1/17/2021
  

  Tom Lankford, 85, Dies; Southern Journalist With Divided Loyalties

  Tom Lankford took many iconic photographs in Birmingham that publicized the cause of Civil Rights protestors. But he worked behind the scenes to cultivate relationships with the city's notorious Bull Connor to buttress the reputation of the police force while working with his publisher to squelch local demands for change that threatened the business community.

• 
• SOURCE: The Bulwark
  1/4/2021
  

  The Bravery of William Winter

  by Stuart Stevens

  Former Mississippi Governor William Winter should be remembered for facing down extremists and advancing a moderate vision of change in Mississippi that centered on education. He died at 97 on December 18. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  1/3/2020
  

  Brian Urquhart, a Foundational Leader at the United Nations, Dies at 101

  "In the mid-1950s, as the lone official in Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold’s inner circle with military experience, Mr. Urquhart helped invent the practice of U.N. peacekeeping through the establishment of the U.N. Emergency Force."

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  12/29/2020
  

  Ted DeLaney, Conscience of a Roiled University, Dies at 77

  Ted DeLaney worked as a custodian at Washington and Lee before graduating at age 41,  returned as a professor, became the school's first Black department chair, and pushed the school to confront the moral and ethical implications of venerating Robert E. Lee. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  12/15/2020
  

  James Flug, Who Helped Block Nixon Nominees and Investigated Watergate, Dies at 81

  James Flug, an aide to Senator Ted Kennedy, played a significant role in Senate investigations and in the successful political opposition to Richard Nixon's Supreme Court nominations of Clement Haynsworth and G. Harrold Carswell. 

• 
• SOURCE: Jacobin
  12/5/2020
  

  Stephen F. Cohen Helped Us Understand the Russian Revolution and Nikolai Bukharin

  by Kevin Murphy

  A fellow historian of Russia and the Soviet Union praises Stephen Cohen's scholarship and willingness to question orthodoxies in examining the internal diversity of revolutionary Communism. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  12/2/2020
  

  Deb Price, First Nationally Syndicated Columnist on Gay Life, Dies at 62

  Deb Price's columns were at the forefront of gay and lesbian journalists working openly in the news media and news outlets covering issues concerning LGBTQ Americans and communities with depth and nuance.

• 
• SOURCE: Lexington Courier-Journal
  12/2/2020
  

  Beloved University of Kentucky History Professor Dies from COVID-19 Months into Retirement

  Professor Bruce Holle of the University of Kentucky was a "student magnet" during his 45-year career. He passed away due to complications of COVID-19 on November 30. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  12/2/2020
  

  David Hackett, Historian and Holocaust Expert, Dies at 80

  Professor Hackett was noted for translating "The Buchenwald Report," made by German-speaking US military officers who described in detail their findings at the liberated concentration camp, preserving a key document for the fight against Holocaust denialism. He died of complications of the coronavirus. 

• 
• SOURCE: Cornell Chronicle
  12/1/2020
  

  American History Scholar Richard Polenberg Dies at 83

  Colleagues remember Richard "Dick" Polenberg as a generous and compassionate colleague and mentor as well as an inspiring teacher and accomplished scholar of modern American history.

• 
• SOURCE: Perspectives on History
  10/30/2020
  

  In Memoriam: Jenny Tone-Pah-Hote (1980–2020)

  by Malinda Maynor Lowery

  "Her contributions to historical scholarship, undergraduate teaching, and graduate mentorship will be remembered, and deeply missed, by all who knew her."

• 
• SOURCE: The New Yorker
  10/29/2020
  

  The Long, Lonesome Roads of Jerry Jeff Walker

  Music writer Amanda Petrusich remembers the iconoclastic songwriter Jerry Jeff Walker, who died this week at 78. 

• 
• 10/17/2020
  

  Vaughn Davis Bornet, 1917-2020

  by Bornet Family

  Vaughn Davis Bornet, a frequent contributor to HNN, was writing history into his 103rd year. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  10/13/2020
  

  Edward C. Meyer, General who Revamped Post-Vietnam ‘Hollow Army,’ Dies at 91

  by 10/13/2020

  During a congressional hearing in 1980, Gen. Meyer used the memorable phrase “a hollow Army” to describe how the military branch had been beset by staffing problems, outdated equipment and general malaise after the Vietnam War.

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  9/18/2020
  

  Stephen F. Cohen, Influential Historian of Russia, Dies at 81

  Stephen Cohen did not shy from controversy, either in his scholarly claims (made at the height of the Cold War) that the Bolshevik revolution contained true democratic potential before being corrupted, or in his criticisms of American efforts to influence post-Soviet Russia.