Solon Justus Buck (August 16, 1884 – May 25, 1962) was the Second

Archivist of the United States The Archivist of the United States is the head and chief administrator of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) of the United States. The Archivist is responsible for the supervision and direction of the National Archives. The ...

. His academic career, never straying very far from his interest in the history of agricultural communities, started with a brief appointment to

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universit ...

followed by two years at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the University ...

, which he left for the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

in 1914, becoming also superintendent of the

Minnesota State Historical Society The Minnesota Historical Society (MNHS) is a nonprofit educational and cultural institution dedicated to preserving the history of the U.S. state of Minnesota. It was founded by the territorial legislature in 1849, almost a decade before statehood ...

. During his long tenure in Minnesota he fought hard for the state's history, helping organize county historical societies, founding a quarterly periodical, and moving the Historical Society from the basement of the State Capitol to its own building. In 1931, Buck was appointed professor of history at the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the universit ...

, and when the U. S. National Archives were established in 1935 he was tapped to be Assistant Director, then in 1941 the second Archivist of the United States. In 1948, he joined the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

as chief of the Manuscript Division, then as Assistant Librarian until his retirement in 1954. He also served as the seventh president of the

Society of American Archivists The Society of American Archivists is the oldest and largest archivist association in North America, serving the educational and informational needs of more than 5,000 individual archivist and institutional members. Established in 1936, the organi ...

, from 1949 to 1951. As might be expected from such a career, Buck's gifts lay in organization, with a particular talent for bibliography; he became an international authority in archival economy. His obituary in the ''American Historical Review'' says of him: "He was a perfectionist with an infinite mastery of detail. He held all his associates to his own high standards of perfection. He was merciless on incompetents, but held the respect of those who worked with him." His works include ''Illinois in 1818'', a sort of preamble to the Illinois Centennial History series; ''The Granger Movement, Travel and Description 1765‑1865'' (Ph. D. thesis, Harvard, 1911), which at his death was still considered the classic treatment of the subject; ''The Agrarian Crusade'' (1919); and, with his wife Elizabeth Hawthorne Buck, ''The Planting of Civilization in Western Pennsylvania'' (1939). He married Elizabeth Hawthorn on June 20, 1919. They had three children: Roger Conant, Mary Margaret, and Stephen Farrington. He had been in poor health the last few years of his life, and he died soon after a fall in which he broke his hip, in Washington, D.C.(May 28, 1962). Solon J. Buck, 78, Ex‑U.S. Archivist; Filing Expert and Historian Dies. Assisted Scholars. ''

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References

* ''Incorporates text from Bill Thayer's site, by permission.''

External links

Archivists of the United States, 1934 - Present

Solon J. Buck papers
at the

Solon J. Buck papers
at the

* *
''Illinois in 1818''
(on Thayer's American & Military History site) {{DEFAULTSORT:Buck, Solon J. 1884 births 1962 deaths Harvard University alumni Indiana University faculty University of Minnesota faculty University of Pittsburgh faculty American archivists National Archives and Records Administration Presidents of the Society of American Archivists Truman administration personnel Franklin D. Roosevelt administration personnel