Herbert Agar
{{Short description|American journalist and historian (1897–1980)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Herbert Agar
| image = Herbert Sebastian Agar.jpg
| caption = Agar in the 1940s
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| birth_date = 29 September 1897
| birth_place = New Rochelle, New York, U.S.
| death_date = 24 November 1980 (aged 83)
| death_place = Sussex, U.K.
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| education =
| alma mater = Columbia University
Princeton University
| employer =
| occupation = Historian
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Herbert Sebastian Agar (29 September 1897 – 24 November 1980) was an American journalist and historian, and an editor of the Louisville Courier-Journal.
Early life and education
Herbert Sebastian Agar was born September 29, 1897, in New Rochelle, New York to John G. Agar and Agnes Louis Macdonough.{{Cite news|url=http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1935/09/21/93709516.html?pageNumber=15|title=JOHN G. AGAR, 79, LAWYER, IS DEAD; Ex-Member of Westchester County Park Board Once a Reform Leader Here|work=The New York Times |access-date=2016-11-30}} He graduated from Columbia University in 1919 and received his master's degree from Princeton University in 1922 and Ph.D. in 1924.{{Cite news|url=http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1980/11/25/113959426.html|title=HERBERT AGAR DIES; AUTHOR AND EDITOR; Wrote Prolifically on the American Democratic Heritage--Won Pulitzer Prize in History A Champion of Democratic Ideals Correspondent and Columnist|work=The New York Times |access-date=2016-11-30}}
Career
Agar won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1934 for his 1933 book The People's Choice, a critical look at the American presidency. Agar was associated with the Southern Agrarians and edited, with Allen Tate, Who Owns America? (1936).Joshua P. Hochschild (2000). [http://www.leaderu.com/ftissues/ft0003/reviews/briefly.html Review of Who Owns America?], First Things. He was also a strong proponent of an Americanized version of the British distributist socioeconomic system.William Fahey (2002). [http://ihspress.com/churchandlandpreface.htm Preface to Vincent McNabb, The Church and the Land (1926)]
Agar's 1950 book The Price of Union was one of John F. Kennedy's favorite books,[http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Favorite+Books+of+President+Kennedy Favorite Books of President Kennedy]{{Dead link|date=January 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} and he kept a copy of it on his desk.{{Cite web |url=http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/The+Presidents+Desk+Page+2.htm |title=The President's Desk, Page 2 |access-date=2010-08-19 |archive-date=2006-10-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061003174416/http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/The+Presidents+Desk+Page+2.htm |url-status=dead }} A passage from The Price of Union about an act of courage by John Quincy Adams gave Kennedy the idea of writing an article about senatorial courage. He showed the passage to his speechwriter Ted Sorensen and asked him to see if he could find some more examples. This Sorensen did, and eventually they had enough for a book, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Profiles in Courage (1956).Ted Sorensen, Joanne J. Myers (2008). [http://www.cceia.org/resources/transcripts/0046.html Counselor: A Life at the Edge of History (Private Lunch)] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091013192613/http://www.cceia.org/resources/transcripts/0046.html |date=2009-10-13 }}, Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.
Personal life and death
On June 8, 1945, Agar married Barbara Wallace, the daughter of the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens and the widow of Euan Wallace, a former British Minister of Transport.{{Cite news|url=http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1945/06/09/305242472.html|title=COMDR. HERBERT AGAR TO MARRY IN LONDON|work=The New York Times |access-date=2016-11-30}}
Agar died on November 24, 1980, in Sussex, England, where he had lived since World War II.
Works
- Milton and Plato (1928)
- The People's Choice: From Washington to Harding — A Study in Democracy (1933) {{ISBN|978-0-9665734-0-4}}{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/peopleschoicefro00agar|url-access=registration|title=The People's Choice: From Washington to Harding; a Study in Democracy|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1933-01-01|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Comp.|language=en}}
- Land of the Free (1935){{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/landoffree00agar|url-access=registration|title=Land of the Free|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1935-01-01|publisher=Houghton Mifflin|language=en}}
- Who Owns America? A New Declaration of Independence (contributor and co-editor with Allen Tate) (1936) {{ISBN|978-1-882926-37-4}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iM2eAAAAIAAJ|title=Who Owns America?: A New Declaration of Independence|last1=Agar|first1=Herbert|last2=Tate|first2=Allen|date=1999-01-01|publisher=ISI Books|isbn=9781882926374|language=en}}
- The Pursuit of Happiness: The Story of American Democracy (1938){{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/priceofunion033116mbp|title=The Price Of Union|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=30 November 1949|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Company.}}
- A Time for Greatness (1942){{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FlEzpHGNFZUC|title=A Time for Greatness|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1942-01-01|publisher=Little, Brown|language=en}}
- The Price of Union: The Influence of the American Temper on the Course of History (1950)
- Abraham Lincoln (1952){{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=P0GTAAAAIAAJ|title=Abraham Lincoln|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1952-01-01|publisher=Collins|language=en}}
- The Unquiet Years: U.S.A. 1945–1955 (1957){{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/unquietyearsusa10000agar|url-access=registration|title=The Unquiet Years: U. S. A. 1945-1955|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1957-01-01|publisher=Hart-Davis|language=en}}
- The Price of Power: America Since 1945 (1957) {{ISBN|978-0-226-00937-7}}{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_0226009378|url-access=registration|title=The Price of Power: America Since 1945|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1957-08-15|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=9780226009377|language=en}}
- The Saving Remnant: An Account of Jewish Survival Since 1914 (1960){{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jGOvAAAAIAAJ|title=The Saving Remnant: An Account of Jewish Survival|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1962-01-01|publisher=Viking Press|language=en}}
- The Perils of Democracy (1965){{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=X0esAAAAIAAJ|title=The perils of democracy|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1965-06-01|publisher=Bodley Head|isbn=9780802310019|language=en}}
- The Darkest Year: Britain Alone, June 1940 - June 1941 (1972){{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yp8kPqOHBpwC|title=The darkest year: Britain alone, June 1940-June 1941|last=Agar|first=Herbert|date=1972-01-01|publisher=Doubleday|isbn=9780385045001|language=en}}
References
{{Reflist|30em}}
{{PulitzerPrize HistoryAuthors 1926–1950}}
{{Southern Agrarians}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Agar, Herbert}}
Category:Writers from New Rochelle, New York
Category:Columbia University alumni
Category:Editors of Kentucky newspapers
Category:Princeton University alumni
Category:Pulitzer Prize for History winners
Category:Journalists from New York (state)
Category:Courier Journal people
Category:Historians from New York (state)
Category:20th-century American journalists