Downs Elected to Society of American Historians
Gregory Downs has earned a string of accolades over his career as a historian of the Civil War and Reconstruction. His latest—election to the Society of American Historians—honors his historical writing.
Downs wrote After Appomattox: Military Occupation and the Ends of War, and Declarations of Dependence: The Long Reconstruction of Popular Politics in the South, among other works. He also co-wrote the National Park Service’s Theme Study on Reconstruction.
He joins about 400 historians and writers in the invitation-only Society of American Historians, which was established in 1939 at Columbia University by the historian/journalist Allan Nevins to promote literary excellence in the writing or presentation of history.
Current fellows are scholars, journalists, independent historians, essayists, biographers, novelists, filmmakers, curators and poets working in many different genres on topics that deal in whole or in part with American history.
Other UC Davis history faculty who are members are Louis Warren, who is the W. Turrentine Jackson Professor of U.S. Western History, and Professor Emeritus David Brody.
— Kathleen Holder, content strategist in the UC Davis College of Letters and Science