If you don’t follow much of what goes on in the history profession, you might not have heard about this. Hell, some people might not have even heard of the man himself.
John Hope Franklin, the elder statesman of African American history, has died at the age of 94. Franklin has been, for over half a century, one of the best-known and best-loved figures in the profession, and his 1947 book, From Slavery to Freedom, is still considered essential reading in the field.
He followed in the footsteps of other pioneering black historians like Carter G. Woodosn, who founded the Journal of Negro History (now the Journal of African American History), at a time when the history profession did not make much room for blacks. And then, during the 1960s and 1970s, when African Americans began to enter the profession in greater numbers in the wake of the civil rights movement, he also suffered the indignity of being called an “oreo” by some people in the younger generation of more radical black scholars and activists.
Franklin himself always maintained that he was not a “Negro historian,” but a “historian of the South” who happened to be black. Through his life and career, he never lost his scholarly rigor, nor his dignity, and to the last he was the very archetype of the professional historian, in all the best ways. I saw him not long ago on a CSPAN Book Talk program, and he was as lucid and sharp and funny as ever. The profession, and the country, are poorer for his passing.
