History department plans to honor Mosse

Plans are pending in the UW–Madison Department of History for a memorial recalling the life and scholarship of George Mosse, the department’s Bascom-Weinstein Professor of Jewish Studies. Mosse died Friday, Jan. 22 from liver cancer.

An internationally recognized expert on European culture and the development of Hitler’s final solution, sexuality and concepts of masculinity, Mosse was born in Berlin, Germany in 1918. In 1938 he narrowly escaped Nazis persecution by fleeing to England. There, he studied at Cambridge University before emigrating to the United States in 1939. He received a B.S. from Haverford College in Pennsylvania, and his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He taught at the University of Iowa before joining the UW faculty in 1955.

After retiring in 1989, Mosse became the first J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Senior Scholar-in-Residence at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. He conducted research at the museum’s Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, and taught a course on 20th century genocide. He also held joint appointments at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Cornell University.

At UW–Madison, Mosse taught courses in European intellectual history and Jewish history, some of which were broadcast as part of Wisconsin Public Radio’s “College of the Air” series. In 1970 the Danford Foundation recognized him with its E. Harris Harbison Prize for Gifted Teaching and scholarship. The Italian government awarded him the Aqui Historical Prize in 1975 for his book, Nationalization of the Masses.

Other books include Toward the Final Solution: A History of European Racism, The Crisis of German Ideology, Nazi Culture and more. His most recent book, The Image of Man: The Creation of Modern Masculinity, was published in 1996.

Mosse was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1984; the Goethe Institute honored him in 1988, and he joined the circle of distinguished senior historians receiving an American Historical Association Award for Scholarly Distinction in 1997. Last November he was awarded the Leo Baeck medal for distinguished contributions to Jewish and European history.

Mosse is survived by his life partner John Tortorice and a niece in California.