James M. McPherson was born in North Dakota and grew up in Minnesota, where he graduated magna cum laude from Gustavus Adolphus College in 1958. He received his Ph.D. in history from Johns Hopkins University in 1963. From 1962 to 2004 he taught at Princeton University, where he now holds the title of George Henry Davis '86 Professor of American History Emeritus. He is the author of some fifteen books and editor of another ten, focusing primarily on the era of the American Civil War and Reconstruction. His books have won several prizes, including the Pulitzer Prize in History for Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era(1989) and two Lincoln Prizes for For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War (1998) and Tried by War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief (2009).
The theme of the 2011-2012 Lowell Lecture series is “Remembering the Civil War.” This is part of the Boston Public Library’s commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.
Event info provided by Boston Public Library.
