Joanna Sliwa's journey into Holocaust studies began in the early 2000s as an undergraduate student at Kean University, where she took the only Holocaust course available, focusing on literature and film. Drawn to the experiences of...

Thomas Weber, a professor of history and international affairs at the University of Aberdeen and a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, is the author of Becoming Hitler: The Making of a Nazi. His research challenges the...

Annette Gordon-Reed, the Carl M. Loeb University Professor at Harvard, is a historian and author of On Juneteenth, a blend of memoir and history. In the book, she explores her family's deep roots in Texas, dating back to the 1820s and...

Debórah Dwork is the director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity at The Graduate Center, CUNY, and an author. Her latest book, Saints and Liars, explores the stories of Americans who...

Deborah Riley Draper is a writer, director, filmmaker, producer, and author of Olympic Pride, American Prejudice. Her documentary and book explore the untold story of 18 African-American athletes who competed in the 1936 Berlin Olympics,...

Bob Dilenschneider's book explores the concept of character—an essential quality built on courage, integrity, and leadership. Through profiles of influential figures such as Mother Teresa, Jimmy Stewart, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Father...

Tommie Shelby, a professor at Harvard University, explores the idea of prison abolition, a concept often dismissed as unrealistic. He explains that abolitionists argue prisons are both ineffective and immoral, and that mass incarceration...

Mary Anne Franks reflects on having had many great teachers, but one mentor, Professor Catharine MacKinnon, had a profound impact on her career path. Although Franks initially disliked law school and planned to return to teaching...

Bradley Hart reflects on the many teachers he's had, both in and out of the classroom, but names his doctoral supervisor, Richard J. Evans, as the most influential. He praises Evans for his encyclopedic knowledge of historiography and...

Bradley W. Hart is a World War II historian at the National WWII Museum in New Orleans. A former professor at CSU Fresno, he earned his PhD from Cambridge and studied the international eugenics movement and its influence on Nazi Germany....

One of the most formative professional experiences for David Greenberg was working with legendary journalist Bob Woodward just a year out of college. Although Greenberg didn’t see himself as a natural newspaper reporter like Woodward, he...

Khatchig Mouradian grew up during the Lebanese Civil War, often taking refuge in bomb shelters and facing frequent school disruptions. During this turbulent time, the school library became his intellectual sanctuary, and the...

H.W. Brands shares that the teacher who had the most influence on his career was his ninth-grade history teacher, Joe DeJardin. Though he didn’t realize it at the time, DeJardin's radical experiment deeply shaped his path. He split the...

Clay Risen, a reporter at The New York Times, explores the era from 1946 to 1957 in his book Red Scare, detailing how anti-communist hysteria shaped American society. During this time, fear of communism infiltrated every level of...

New York Times reporter Clay Risen reflects on his journalism career, crediting much of his growth to two influential mentors—a husband and wife team. Haywood Moxley, his high school English teacher, taught him to think critically about...

UC San Diego professor Agustina Paglayan reflects on the many teachers and mentors who influenced her, making it difficult to choose just one. She highlights a high school teacher and several university professors who shared two key...

Professor Richard Evans recalls that the teacher who most influenced him was John Walsh, a history tutor at Jesus College, Oxford, where Evans studied in the 1960s. Walsh was known for prioritizing teaching over publishing and was deeply...

Joanna Sliwa is a historian, educator, and author working at the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, where she administers academic programs on Holocaust studies. She co-authored The Counterfeit Countess: The Jewish...

Professor Thomas Weber honors Simon Price, his college advisor at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, remembering him as one of the most supportive mentors he could imagine. Weber recalls arriving at Oxford in 1996 to study ancient and modern...

One of Annette Gordon-Reed’s most influential teachers was her high school speech and debate coach, Sharon Walker. From ninth through twelfth grade, Walker instilled confidence in her, encouraging her to participate in speech and debate...

Annette Gordon-Reed, a professor at Harvard University, wrote a groundbreaking book in the 1990s examining the relationship between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, an enslaved woman at Monticello. Initially interested in how...

Debórah Dwork’s reflections on her mentor, Marion Pritchard, highlight the deep moral and historical lessons she gained from their relationship. Pritchard’s role as a rescuer during the Holocaust was not just an act of bravery but a...

Throughout her life, Deborah Riley Draper has learned from everyone she met, but her greatest teacher has been her mother, Janette Coleman Riley. A dedicated public school teacher for over 40 years, she instilled in her the values of...

Lou Gehrig and Bill Russell exemplified character in sports through their humility, leadership, and dedication to their teams and communities. Gehrig, a legendary first baseman for the Yankees, was a quiet, team-first player known for...