Betty C. Wood (23 February 1945 – 3 September 2021) was a British historian and academic, who specialised in

early American history The colonial history of the United States covers the history of European colonization of North America from the early 17th century until the incorporation of the Thirteen Colonies into the United States after the Revolutionary War. In the ...

Atlantic history Atlantic history is a specialty field in history that studies the Atlantic World in the early modern period. The Atlantic World was created by the discovery of a new land by Europeans, and Atlantic History is the study of that world. It is p ...

social history Social history, often called the new social history, is a field of history that looks at the lived experience of the past. In its "golden age" it was a major growth field in the 1960s and 1970s among scholars, and still is well represented in his ...

, and slavery in eighteenth and early nineteenth century. She was a Fellow of

Girton College, Cambridge Girton College is one of the 31 constituent colleges of the University of Cambridge. The college was established in 1869 by Emily Davies and Barbara Bodichon as the first women's college in Cambridge. In 1948, it was granted full college status ...

(1971–2011) and taught in the

Faculty of History, University of Cambridge The Faculty of History is one of the constituent departments of the University of Cambridge. Teaching and research of history has centuries old roots at Cambridge and the first Regius Professorship of Modern History was established by King Geor ...

, rising to become

Reader A reader is a person who reads. It may also refer to: Computing and technology * Adobe Reader (now Adobe Acrobat), a PDF reader * Bible Reader for Palm, a discontinued PDA application * A card reader, for extracting data from various forms of ...

in American History.

Biography

Wood was born on 23 February 1945 in

Melton Constable Melton Constable is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. It covers an area of and had a population of 518 in 225 households at the 2001 census. The population had increased to 618 at the 2011 Census. For the purposes of ...

, Norfolk, England. She was educated at

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented secondary school ...

s in Fakenham and Scunthorpe. She studied geography at the University of Keele, graduating with a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

(BA) degree in 1967. She then studied social and economic history at the

London School of Economics , mottoeng = To understand the causes of things , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £240.8 million (2021) , budget = £391.1 millio ...

, graduating with a

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...

(MA) degree in 1968. In a move highly unusual at the time, she studied history at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

and completed her

Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common Academic degree, degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields ...

(PhD) degree in 1975. During the three years she lived in the United States, she experienced the race riots of the 1960s, the

civil rights movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...

, and developed her interest in the early history of the United States and its racial complexities. She was a

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

from 1971 until her retirement in 2011: the college awarded her a life fellowship, which she held until her death. She was additionally Director of Studies in history at Girton from 1974 to 1984. Having been a lecturer in the

since the 1970s, she was made

in American History by the university in either 1995 or 1999. During her career, she acted as

doctoral supervisor A doctoral advisor (also dissertation director, dissertation advisor; or doctoral supervisor) is a member of a university faculty whose role is to guide graduate students who are candidates for a doctorate, helping them select coursework, as well ...

for 19 PhD students. In 2019, at its 133rd annual meeting, Wood was made an Honorary Foreign Member of the

American Historical Association The American Historical Association (AHA) is the oldest professional association of historians in the United States and the largest such organization in the world. Founded in 1884, the AHA works to protect academic freedom, develop professional s ...

. Having had cancer, Wood died on 3 September 2021 at

Addenbrooke's Hospital Addenbrooke's Hospital is an internationally renowned large teaching hospital and research centre in Cambridge, England, with strong affiliations to the University of Cambridge. Addenbrooke's Hospital is based on the Cambridge Biomedical Campu ...

, Cambridge: she was 76 years old.

Selected works

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wood, Betty C. 1945 births 2021 deaths British women historians 20th-century British historians 21st-century British historians Cultural historians Social historians Historians of North America Alumni of Keele University Alumni of the London School of Economics University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences alumni Fellows of Girton College, Cambridge Members of the University of Cambridge faculty of history