Dumas Malone
Dumas Malone (DEW-mah; January 10, 1892 – December 27, 1986) was an American historian, minister, and biographer. A professor by occupation, Malone spent the majority of his career teaching at the University of Virginia (UVA), where he served as the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Professor of History.
Dumas Malone | |
|---|---|
| Born | 10 January 1892 Coldwater, Mississippi, U.S. |
| Died | 27 December 1986 (aged 94) |
| Spouse |
Elizabeth Gifford (m. 1925) |
| Relatives | Kemp Malone (brother) |
| Awards | Pulitzer Prize for History (1975) Presidential Medal of Freedom (1983) |
| Academic background | |
| Education | Emory College (BA) Yale University (BDiv, MA, PhD) |
| Thesis | The Public Life of Thomas Cooper, 1783–1839 (1923) |
| Doctoral advisor | Allen Johnson |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Historiography |
| Institutions | Yale University University of Virginia Harvard University Columbia University |
| Notable works | Jefferson and His Time |
| Signature | |
Malone was best known for his six-volume biography, Jefferson and His Time, for which he received the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for History. Completed in 1981, the series became Malone's defining work and is considered the foremost authoritative biography of Thomas Jefferson. Before beginning a lifelong career as a biographer, he was editor-in-chief of the twenty-volume Dictionary of American Biography and the third director of the Harvard University Press. In 1983, President Ronald Reagan awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.