In May, we asked our alumni: "What was your favorite history class at Rochester? Tell us about it!" Here's what they said:
Kurt Eyrich (BA '74): "American Colonial History, John Waters - A fascinating course about the life of families in early colonial days. Dr. Waters was passionate about his studies."
Herb Gliick (BA '58): "Harry Benda's Intellectual History honors seminar. It was more than just learning. It was exploring and challenging. It was the best of my UR experience."
Allan Groves (BA '64): "French Canada with Mason Wade. This was a graduate seminar that I took as a senior. There were 5 of us in the class. We wrote a paper every two weeks, and researched and critiqued others' papers in the intervening weeks. That was when I really learned to write under deadline!"
Travis Hughes (BA '11): "'The Beats and Beyond.' This was an exploration of the Beat Generation, the literary works they published, and American culture of the 1950s."
Judith Kerman (BA '67): "Loren Baritz, American Intellectual History. It was more cultural history than intellectual history, but thoroughly exciting. Made me a lifelong fan of Moby Dick."
Paul Lester (BA '71): "Chinese Intellectual History Honors Seminar (8 credits) taught by Professor Ralph Crozier—who had studied in China. I believe he was Canadian and did not have the travel restrictions to China we had in the US? Met at his home one night weekly for 3 hours. Must have read 20 books during the semester. A treasure trove of philosophy and historical approaches to ancient and modern (for the time) China. Took this course the last semester of my senior year."
Eugene L. Mascoli (BA '58): "I was a student at the U of R from 1954-1958. One of my favorite classes was taught by Richard C. Wade, who was also known as 'Jake Wade.' He taught classes about early American cities and how they helped the growth of the United States. 'Jake' would enter the classroom, well dressed with a sports jacket, shirt and tie, and carry a small loose leaf notebook. He would then read from his notebook a beautiful narrative about the development of American cities. I think a lot of those lectures was the basis for some of his later books. It was a pleasure to be one of his students, as I think about his lectures given 65 years ago!"
Donald Messina (BA '56, MA '57): "I had three, yes three favorite history classes: one with Vera Michaels Dean who taught me so much about India; Dr. Arthur J. May all about World War I's start with Gavrilo Princip's assassination of the Austrian Archduke and his wife; and Harry J. Benda, who related his experiences as a Dutch citizen and civil servant under arrest by the Japanese in Sumatra during the war, and his excellent teaching that our essays were woefully inferior to the excellence we can achieve using correct English, which he deeply cherished!"
Wayne L. Miller (BA '71): "Professor Christopher's honors seminar, The French Revolution, immediately comes to mind. Reading Rudé's The Crowd in the French Revolution even as we were organizing sit-ins, teach-ins, student strikes, and marches on Washington was such a cautionary tale that it and readings on the Reign of Terror and so forth served to temper my desire for the revolution that many of us thought was imminent. And Dr. Christopher's pedagogy led us to drawing many of our own conclusions seemingly on our own, as is the best thing one can say about a teacher."
Mark Solomons (BA '67): "A.W. Salomone's Italian History Honors Seminar called From the Renaissance to the Resorgimento. It was held at his home in his library which was so filled with books and papers you had to wonder how the shelves held the weight of it all. We could smoke and had an occasional glass of wine and snacks. Cozy chairs and great conversation - and nice memories."
Sue Spector (BA '62): "Dr. Richard Wade’s The City in American History, and Dr. Arthur May’s Europe since 1914."
Steven Vegh (BA '80): "A class on the Vietnam War, including its colonial history, fascinating and timely!"
Mitchell Zuckerman (BA '68): "There were three, tied for first place: Loren Baritz, American intellectual history; Hayden White, European intellectual history; and RJ Kaufmann, honors seminar in European intellectual history. It’s been more than 50 years, so maybe those aren’t the exact course titles, but those teachers and several others changed my life. I went on to graduate study at Harvard with the heirs of Perry Miller, including Bernard Bailyn and Donald Fleming. The well known Harvard historians were great, but not greater than the teachers I had in the late ‘60’s at Rochester. These included NO Brown in the Ecstatic studies department, and Paul Levine in American literature. I didn’t fully appreciate as an 18-20 year old how privileged I was to be taught by these teachers and others in that period. I do now."
Thank you to everyone who participated. We'll be back with a new question in July!