Starr, Kevin
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Kevin Owen Starr (September 3, 1940 – January 14, 2017) was an American
historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human species; as well as the ...
and California's state librarian, best known for his multi-volume series on the
history of California The history of California can be divided into the Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Native American period (about 10,000 years ago until 1542), the Exploration of North America, European exploration period (1542–1769), the Spanish colonial ...
, collectively called "Americans and the California Dream." After an impoverished childhood, he received degrees from various universities where he studied history and literature. Beginning in 1973, Starr wrote nine books on the history of California during his career, along with being professor or visiting lecturer at numerous California universities. From 1989 until his death in 2017, he was a professor at the
University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...
. From 1994 to 2004 Starr was California's state librarian. He continued writing California history throughout his career, receiving a
Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...
, membership in the
Society of American Historians The Society of American Historians, founded in 1939, encourages and honors literary distinction in the writing of history and biography about American topics. The approximately 300 members include professional historians, independent scholars, jou ...
, and the Gold Medal of the
Commonwealth Club of California The Commonwealth Club World Affairs of California is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization based in Northern California. Founded in 1903, it is the oldest and largest public affairs forum in the United States. Membership is open to ...
. In 2006 he was presented a
National Humanities Medal The National Humanities Medal is an American award that annually recognizes several individuals, groups, or institutions for work that has "deepened the nation's understanding of the humanities, broadened our citizens' engagement with the humani ...
from President
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...
for his work as a scholar and historian, and in 2010 was inducted into the California Hall of Fame.


Early life and education

Kevin Starr was born on September 3, 1940, in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
, to Owen Starr, a machinist, and Marian Starr (née Collins), a bank teller. He was a seventh generation Californian. Starr's parents divorced when he was a child. When he was six his mother had a nervous breakdown, after which Starr and his younger brother, James, were placed in a Roman Catholic orphanage in Ukiah. Five years later, he and his brother were reunited with their mother, where they lived in a
public housing project Public housing, also known as social housing, refers to subsidized or affordable housing provided in buildings that are usually owned and managed by local government, central government, nonprofit organizations or a combination thereof ...
in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
, while they subsisted on welfare. He attended St. Boniface School in the Tenderloin neighborhood. He later enrolled in the
University of San Francisco The University of San Francisco (USF) is a Private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit university in San Francisco, California, United States. Founded in 1855, it has nearly 9,000 students pursuing undergraduate and graduate degrees ...
, a Jesuit institution, where he graduated with a
Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...
degree in English in 1962. At the school, he was editor of ''The Foghorn,'' the school newspaper."Kevin Starr, Prolific Chronicler of California’s History, Dies at 76"
''
New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', Jan. 16, 2017
After graduation he was commissioned as an armor officer in the
United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary Land warfare, land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of th ...
. He served for two years as a lieutenant with the 4th Battalion,
68th Armor Regiment The 68th Armor Regiment is an tank, armored regiment of the United States Army. It was first activated in 1933 in the Regular Army as the 68th Infantry Regiment (Light Tanks). Lineage World War I The regiment was originally constituted on 9 J ...
, first as a platoon leader and then as the Assistant S-1. The 4/68 Armor Bn was assigned to the 3rd Brigade, 8th Infantry Division and was located at
Coleman Barracks Coleman Barracks/Coleman Army Airfield (ICAO: ETOR) is a United States Army military installation located in the Sandhofen district of Mannheim, Germany. It is assigned to U.S. Army, Europe (USAREUR) and administered by the U.S. Army Installat ...
near Mannheim in West Germany. Upon release from the service, Starr entered
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
, earning an
M.A. A Master of Arts ( or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA or AM) 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. Those admitted to the degree have ...
in English in 1965 and a Ph.D. in the discipline (specializing in
American literature American literature is literature written or produced in the United States of America and in the British colonies that preceded it. The American literary tradition is part of the broader tradition of English-language literature, but also ...
) in 1969. He subsequently launched his teaching career at Harvard as an assistant (and later associate) professor of English from 1969 to 1973 before returning to California.
Full CV
in
PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...
format from October 2003)


Career

In 1973, he became an aide and speechwriter to San Francisco mayor
Joseph Alioto Joseph Lawrence Alioto (February 12, 1916 – January 29, 1998) was an American politician who served as the 36th mayor of San Francisco, California, from 1968 to 1976. Biography Alioto was born in San Francisco in 1916. His father, Giuseppe A ...
. He was also appointed city librarian, during which time he earned a master's degree in
library science Library and information science (LIS)Library and Information Sciences is the name used in the Dewey Decimal Classification for class 20 from the 18th edition (1971) to the 22nd edition (2003). are two interconnected disciplines that deal with info ...
from the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...
, in 1974. He also did post-doctoral work at the
Graduate Theological Union The Graduate Theological Union (GTU) is a consortium of eight private independent American Seminary, theological schools and eleven centers and affiliates. Seven of the theological schools are located in Berkeley, California. The GTU was founded ...
in Berkeley. From 1976 to 1983, Starr wrote a column for the ''San Francisco Examiner''. In one column, he described himself as “a conservative neo-Thomist Roman Catholic with Platonist leanings and occasional temptations towards anarchy.” He opposed what he called San Francisco's "rigid inquisitorial orthodoxy," which he identified with the city's Democratic leadership, and defended Proposition 13, which capped increases in property tax rates. After Patricia Hearst was abducted by the Symbionese Liberation Army, denounced her parents, and participated in the SLA's bank robberies, Starr described Hearst, whose father was president of the ''San Francisco Examiner'', as "a political prisoner of the politics of class resentment." In one speech, San Francisco supervisor Harvey Milk referred to Starr as a bigot and grouped him with anti-gay activists. After leaving the ''Examiner'' and running unsuccessfully for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Starr tempered his political views and refashioned his public persona. Beginning in 1973, Starr wrote nine books on the history of California, eight of which comprise his ''Americans and the California Dream'' series. It was at Harvard that he first became inspired to write about California's history, after browsing through their collection of books about California and the Pacific Coast. He explained the impact those books had on him: From 1974 to 1989 he was professor or visiting lecturer at numerous California universities, including
UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkele ...
,
University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...
,
UC Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Davis, California, United States. It is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University ...
,
UC Riverside The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public land-grant research university in Riverside, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The main campus sits on in ...
,
Santa Clara University Santa Clara University is a private university, private Jesuit university in Santa Clara, California, United States. Established in 1851, Santa Clara University is the oldest operating institution of higher learning in California. The university' ...
, the University of San Francisco, and
Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
. He was also a columnist for the ''
San Francisco Examiner The ''San Francisco Examiner'' is a newspaper distributed in and around San Francisco, California, and has been published since 1863. Once self-dubbed the "Monarch of the Dailies" by then-owner William Randolph Hearst and the flagship of the He ...
'' and served as the Vatican correspondent for
Hearst Newspapers Hearst may refer to: Places * Hearst, former name of Hacienda, California, United States * Hearst, Ontario, town in Northern Ontario, Canada * Hearst, California, an unincorporated community in Mendocino County, United States * Hearst Island, a ...
, covering the elections of Popes
John Paul I Pope John Paul I (born Albino Luciani; 17 October 1912 – 28 September 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 26 August 1978 until his death 33 days later. His reign is among the shortest in papal h ...
and
John Paul II Pope John Paul II (born Karol Józef Wojtyła; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 16 October 1978 until Death and funeral of Pope John Paul II, his death in 2005. In his you ...
in 1978. In 1989 Starr became Professor of Urban and Regional Planning at the
University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...
, he then became Professor of History, and he was designated University Professor in 1998. Starr sometimes taught at the USC State Capital Center in
Sacramento, California Sacramento ( or ; ; ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of California and the county seat, seat of Sacramento County, California, Sacramento County. Located at the confluence of the Sacramento Rive ...
. Starr was appointed by Governor Pete Wilson to serve as California's state librarian, a post he managed from 1994 to 2004, at which time
Governor A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political regions, political region, in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the ...
Arnold Schwarzenegger Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger (born July30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, businessman, former politician, and former professional bodybuilder, known for his roles in high-profile action films. Governorship of Arnold Schwarzenegger, ...
named him State Librarian
Emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...
. Starr oversaw the allocation of $350 million in local library construction money after voters approved a statewide library borrowing measure in 2000. As a child, Starr had to read the newspaper to his visually impaired father, an experience which led him to create a statewide service that allowed
visually impaired Visual or vision impairment (VI or VIP) is the partial or total inability of visual perception. In the absence of treatment such as corrective eyewear, assistive devices, and medical treatment, visual impairment may cause the individual difficul ...
people to call a phone number to connect with someone who would read the news to them. California state librarian Greg Lucas calls Starr "truly, one of a kind. No other historian has been able to capture California's exceptionalism, its vitality and its promise in such detail and yet invest it with the immediacy and excitement of a page-turner novel." Starr's library assistant, Mattie Taormina, notes that "Starr made you excited to be a Californian because you were going to create the future California." Starr is the author of the multi-volume history of California collectively entitled "Americans and the California Dream". The first volume in the series, ''Americans and the California Dream, 1850–1915'' was published in 1973. The final volume, entitled ''Golden Dreams: California in an Age of Abundance,'' covers the period from 1950 to 1963 and won the 2009 ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
'' Book Prize for history.


Awards and honors

His writing won him a
Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...
, membership in the Society of American Historians, and the Gold Medal of the
Commonwealth Club of California The Commonwealth Club World Affairs of California is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization based in Northern California. Founded in 1903, it is the oldest and largest public affairs forum in the United States. Membership is open to ...
. In 2006, Starr was made a member of the College of Fellows of the
Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology The Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology (DSPT) is a Catholic graduate school in Berkeley, California. It is a member of the interfaith Graduate Theological Union (GTU) and an affiliate of the University of California Berkeley. DSPT ...
in
Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...
. In 2006 he was presented a
National Humanities Medal The National Humanities Medal is an American award that annually recognizes several individuals, groups, or institutions for work that has "deepened the nation's understanding of the humanities, broadened our citizens' engagement with the humani ...
from President
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...
for his work as a scholar and historian. And in 2010, Governor
Arnold Schwarzenegger Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger (born July30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, businessman, former politician, and former professional bodybuilder, known for his roles in high-profile action films. Governorship of Arnold Schwarzenegger, ...
and
Maria Shriver Maria Owings Shriver ( ; born November 6, 1955) is an American journalist, author, a member of the prominent Shriver and Kennedy families, former First Lady of California, and the founder of the nonprofit organization The Women's Alzheimer's M ...
inducted Starr into the
California Hall of Fame The California Hall of Fame is an institution created in 2006 by Maria Shriver to honor important Californians. The award was designed by Californian artists Robert Graham (sculptor), Robert Graham. The hall is located in The California Museum i ...
."Kevin Starr, California’s premier historian, dead at 76"
''
The Sacramento Bee ''The Sacramento Bee'' is a daily newspaper published in Sacramento, California, in the United States. Since its foundation in 1857, ''The Bee'' has become the largest newspaper in Sacramento, the fifth largest newspaper in California, and the 2 ...
'', Jan. 15, 2017
Composer
John Adams John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
was inspired by the "Dream" series of books to write the piece '' City Noir'' in 2009. Starr received The Robert Kirsch Award by the ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
'' as part of the 2012
Los Angeles Times Book Prize Since 1980, the ''Los Angeles Times'' has awarded a set of annual book prizes. The ''Los Angeles Times'' Book Prize currently has nine categories: biography, current interest, fiction, first fiction (the Art Seidenbaum Award added in 1991), his ...
s.


Death

Starr died of a
heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when Ischemia, blood flow decreases or stops in one of the coronary arteries of the heart, causing infarction (tissue death) to the heart muscle. The most common symptom ...
in San Francisco on January 14, 2017.


Works

* ''Land's End'' (a novel) (1979) * ''Americans and the California Dream, 1850–1915''. (1973 and 1986) New York, NY: Oxford University Press. pp. 494. (1986) * ''Inventing the Dream: California through the Progressive Era'' (1985) * ''Material Dreams: Southern California through the 1920s'' (1990) * ''Endangered Dreams: The Great Depression in California'' (1996) * ''The Dream Endures: California Enters the 1940s'' (1997) * * ''Embattled Dreams: California in War and Peace, 1940–1950'' (2002) * ''Coast Of Dreams: California on the Edge, 1990–2003'' (2004) * * * *''Continental Ambitions: Roman Catholics in North America: the Colonial Experience.'' (2016) Ignatius Press; Sewn edition. pp. 675.


See also

*
Bibliography of California history This is a bibliography of California history. It contains English language (including translations) books and mainstream academic journal articles published after World War II. About Inclusion criteria This list is not intended to be a comprehens ...


References


External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Starr, Kevin 1940 births 2017 deaths Harvard University alumni Historians of the American West Historians of California National Humanities Medal recipients University of San Francisco alumni University of San Francisco faculty University of Southern California faculty Writers from San Francisco Historians from California Librarians from California