Jack Pole, an Oxford University professor emeritus whom The Times (of London) called the “foremost British historian of the United States in his generation,” died Jan. 30, 2010. He was 87, and had suffered from Parkinson’s disease.
After serving in the British Army from 1941 to 1946, Pole graduated from Oxford in 1949 and received a Ph.D. in history from Princeton in 1953. He then taught at the University of London. After a decade, he moved to Cambridge, and in 1978 he was elected to the Rhodes Chair in American History at Oxford, which he held until retiring in 1989.
At Cambridge and Oxford, Pole expanded the teaching of American history. He attracted eminent U.S. historians to Cambridge for the Pitt Professorship and to Oxford for the Visiting Harmsworth Chair. Pole wrote a series of books on the American Revolution and its aftermath, notably Political Representation in England and the Origins of the American Republic (1966). His The Pursuit of Equality in American History (1978) also is highly regarded. During his retirement, Pole had been a contributing member of the APGA.
Pole was married to Marilyn Mitchell from 1952 to 1988. He is survived by their three children and his companion of later years, Janet Wilson.
Graduate memorials are prepared by the APGA.