R. Don Higginbotham, a leading expert on the American Revolution and George Washington, will deliver the annual Thomas Fulbright Lecture in History at 11 a.m. Feb. 23 in Graham Chapel as part of the Assembly Series. His talk is titled “George Washington’s Remarkable Generation.”
As the Dowd Professor of American History at the University of North Carolina, Higginbotham’s research interests are primarily in American history to 1815. He has also written on comparative revolution — America and Mexico, American and Vietnam, and the American and Confederate revolutions — as well as leadership roles.
As an authority on George Washington and the American Revolution, in his book George Washington: Uniting a Nation (2002), he focuses on Washington’s role in the formation of the state and argues that Washington’s greatest contribution to American life was creating a sense of American unity.
Higginbotham is working on a nonmilitary study of Washington and his relationship to the revolution. Some of his other works include George Washington Reconsidered: Selected Essays (2001), War and Society in Revolutionary America (1998) George Washington and the American Military Tradition (1985), and numerous journal articles.
After earning a master’s at WUSTL in 1954, Higginbotham earned a doctorate at Duke University in 1958.
Besides his research and teaching responsibilities at North Carolina, he has also taught at West Point Military Academy, where he frequently returns to lecture.
Assembly Series lectures are free and open to the public. For more information, call 935-4620 or go online to assemblyseries.wustl.edu.