Gerhard Masur, well known to readers of the HAHR for his biography of Simón Bolívar, his studies of nationalism in Latin America, as well as other writings in the Latin American field, died in Lynchburg, Virginia, on June 17, 1975. He was born in Berlin on September 17, 1901 and took his Ph.D. degee, summa cum laude, from the University of Berlin. From 1930 to 1935, he was research assistant and privatdozent at the University. In protest to the Hitler regime, he left the city of his birth in 1935, taking up residence in Bogotá, Colombia, where he became a consultant to the Ministry of Education and taught at the Escuela Normal Superior. Within a year he had begun work on his well-known biography of the Liberator. At the end of World War II, he came to the United States with the completed manuscript in his hand. Accepting a position as professor of history at Sweetbriar College in 1947, he devoted the remainder of his professional career to this institution, with the exception of sabbatical years spent at the universities of Berlin, Berkeley, and San Diego, and summer teaching at the Universities of Virginia and New Mexico.
Dr. Masur was esteemed as a scholar and was admired and loved by his students, many of whom now occupy eminent positions in the advanced fields of history. His interests ranged widely, embracing not only the history of Latin America, but also the cultural history of Europe before the First World War and the political history of Germany under the Kaiser. His best known works are: Simón Bolívar (University of New Mexico Press, 1948), Prophets of Yesterday, 1890-1914 (Macmillan and Company, 1961), Nationalism in Latin America (Macmillan, 1966), Imperial Berlin (Basic Books, 1971) and a collection of essays, entitled Geschehen und Geschichte, published by the Historische Kommission of Berlin in 1971.
By all who knew him, Gerhard Masur was considered not only a distinguished and penetrating scholar and inspiring teacher, but a highly civilized citizen of the world during some of its most troubled days. He is survived by his wife, Helen Gaylord Masur, a retired professor of Randolph Macon College, in Lynchburg, Virginia.
Author notes
I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Professor Emeritus Helen Masur.
