Albert Morton Craig (December 9, 1927 – December 1, 2021) was an American academic, historian, author and professor emeritus in the Department of History at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

.Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies (RIJS)
faculty
/ref>

Early life

As a youth in Chicago, Craig was an Eagle Scout, and also participated in both competitive swimming and judo. A more scholarly interest in Japan was piqued after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. While doing counterintelligence work for the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

in 1946 and 1947, he was stationed in Miyazaki and in

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

. While in Kyoto, he earned a third degree black belt in judo. Craig earned an undergraduate degree in philosophy in 1949 at

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...

, where he was member of Phi Beta Kappa. While there, he set an NCAA freshman record in the 200 yard breaststroke. After college, the

Fulbright Program The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people of ...

made it possible for him to study economic history at the

University of Strasbourg The University of Strasbourg (french: Université de Strasbourg, Unistra) is a public research university located in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, with over 52,000 students and 3,300 researchers. The French university traces its history to the ea ...

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

. This was followed by two years (1951–53) as a graduate student at Kyoto University from 1951 through 1953. He did his doctoral dissertation at Harvard University under the supervision of

Edwin O. Reischauer Edwin Oldfather Reischauer (; October 15, 1910 – September 1, 1990) was an American diplomat, educator, and professor at Harvard University. Born in Tokyo to American educational missionaries, he became a leading scholar of the history and cul ...

and also worked with

John K. Fairbank John King Fairbank (May 24, 1907 – September 14, 1991) was an American historian of China and United States–China relations. He taught at Harvard University from 1936 until his retirement in 1977. He is credited with building the field of Ch ...

. Harvard awarded Craig his Ph.D. in history in 1959.

Career

Professor Craig became a member of Harvard's faculty in 1959 and then taught there for forty years, during which he was also a visiting professor at the

University of Tokyo , abbreviated as or UTokyo, is a public research university located in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1877, the university was the first Imperial University and is currently a Top Type university of the Top Global University Project by ...

, the

University of Kyoto , mottoeng = Freedom of academic culture , established = , type = Public (National) , endowment = ¥ 316 billion (2.4 billion USD) , faculty = 3,480 (Teaching Staff) , administrative_staff = 3,978 (Total Staff) , students = 22 ...

, and Keio University. He became the Harvard-Yenching Research Professor of Japanese History. In addition, he served as Director of the Reischauer Institute (1983–1985) and as Director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute (1976–1987). His research focused primarily on the transition from the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

through the

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

Selected works

In a statistical overview derived from writings by and about Albert Craig,

OCLC OCLC, Inc., doing business as OCLC, See also: is an American nonprofit cooperative organization "that provides shared technology services, original research, and community programs for its membership and the library community at large". It was ...

WorldCat WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the OCL ...

encompasses roughly 60+ works in 200+ publications in 7 languages and 8,000+ library holdings.WorldCat Identities

Craig, Albert M.
/ref> * ''Chōshū in the Meiji Restoration'' (1961) * ''Personality in Japanese History'' (1971), with

Donald Shively Donald Howard Shively (May 11, 1921 – August 13, 2005) was an American academic, historian, Japanologist, author and professor emeritus of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Berkeley.Fox, Margalit "Donald H. Shi ...

* ''The Heritage of Japanese Civilization'' (2003) * ''The Heritage of Chinese Civilization'' (2001) * ''The Heritage of World Civilizations'' (2005) * ''Civilization and Enlightenment: The Early Thought of Fukuzawa Yukichi'' (2009)

Honors

* Guggenheim FellowshipPearson, Longman/Prentiss Hall
Author bio
/ref> * Fulbright Fellowship * Japan Foundation Fellowship *

Order of the Rising Sun The is a Japanese order, established in 1875 by Emperor Meiji. The Order was the first national decoration awarded by the Japanese government, created on 10 April 1875 by decree of the Council of State. The badge features rays of sunlight ...

, 1988 * At ages 80 and 85, Craig set world masters records for those age groups in the 200 meter breaststroke.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Craig, Albert M 1927 births 2021 deaths 20th-century American historians 20th-century American male writers American Japanologists Harvard University faculty Northwestern University alumni Kyoto University alumni Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni United States Army soldiers American expatriates in France American expatriates in Japan American male non-fiction writers Fulbright alumni