Annette Gordon-Reed facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Annette Gordon-Reed
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Gordon-Reed in 2011
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Annette Gordon
November 19, 1958 Livingston, Texas, U.S.
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| Education | Dartmouth College (BA) Harvard University (JD) |
| Occupation | Professor, author, historian |
| Employer | Harvard Law School Harvard University Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study |
| Known for | American Legal History, American Slavery and the Law |
| Spouse(s) | Robert Reed |
| Children | 2 |
| Awards | National Book Award for Nonfiction, MacArthur Fellowship, Pulitzer Prize for History |
Annette Gordon-Reed (born November 19, 1958) is a well-known American historian and law professor. She teaches at Harvard University as a University Professor and a history professor. She is famous for her important work on Thomas Jefferson and his relationship with Sally Hemings and their children.
In 2009, she won the Pulitzer Prize for History and 15 other awards for her book about the Hemings family of Monticello. In 2010, she received the National Humanities Medal and a MacArthur Fellowship. These awards recognize her amazing contributions to history.
Contents
Early Life and Education
Annette Gordon-Reed was born in Livingston, Texas. She grew up in Conroe, Texas during a time when laws called Jim Crow kept Black and white people separate. She was the first Black child to attend her elementary school there.
When she was in third grade, she became very interested in Thomas Jefferson. She went on to graduate from Dartmouth College in 1981. Later, she earned her law degree from Harvard Law School in 1984. While at Harvard, she was part of the Harvard Law Review, a respected legal journal.
Family Life
Annette Gordon-Reed is married to Robert R. Reed. He is a justice on the Supreme Court of the State of New York. They met when they were both studying at Harvard Law School. Today, she lives in New York with her husband and their two children, Gordon and Susan.
Career as a Professor and Author
Annette Gordon-Reed started her career working at a law firm and advising the New York City Board of Corrections. She often speaks at conferences about history and law. Before joining Harvard, she was a law professor at New York Law School and a history professor at Rutgers University.
In 2010, she began teaching at Harvard University. She holds positions in both the history and law departments. In 2014, she was a visiting professor at the University of Oxford in England.
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Her Books and Historical Work
Annette Gordon-Reed has written several important books that have changed how we understand American history.
Vernon Can Read! (2001)
This book is a memoir, which is a true story about someone's life. Gordon-Reed wrote it with Vernon Jordan, a famous civil rights activist. The book tells the story of Jordan's life from childhood through the 1980s. It won several awards, including Best Nonfiction Book for 2001 from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association.
The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (2008)
In 2008, Gordon-Reed published this groundbreaking book. It is the first part of a planned two-volume history about the Hemings family. This family were enslaved people at Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson. Gordon-Reed's book brought their stories to life. She traced the many family members who lived at Monticello. This book was highly praised for showing the lives of an enslaved family in a new way. It won the Pulitzer Prize for History and 15 other awards.
Andrew Johnson (2011)
In 2011, Gordon-Reed wrote a biography about Andrew Johnson, who became president after the Civil War. She explored his actions and how he was viewed by history. She explains that Johnson did not support the full integration of freedmen (formerly enslaved people) into American society. This caused delays in their freedom and equality.
Gordon-Reed points out that many historians later criticized Johnson for his lack of action regarding African Americans. She notes that abolitionist leader Frederick Douglass understood that Johnson was not a friend to African Americans.
In her book, Gordon-Reed suggests that if formerly enslaved people had been given land, much of their suffering could have been avoided. Without land, many African Americans in the South became sharecroppers. This meant they worked on land owned by white people. They often had few choices and little money.
Awards and Special Recognition
Annette Gordon-Reed was the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize for History. This was for her 2008 book about the Hemings family. She received 15 other awards for that book.
- 2008
- National Book Award for Nonfiction
- Society for Historians of the Early American Republic Book Award
- 2009
- Pulitzer Prize in History
- George Washington Book Prize
- Anisfield-Wolf Book Award
- New Jersey Council of the Humanities Book Award
- Frederick Douglass Prize
- Owsley Award from the Southern Historical Association
- Library of Virginia Literary Award
- 2010
- On February 25, 2010, President Barack Obama gave Annette Gordon-Reed the National Humanities Medal. This is the highest national honor for achievements in the arts and humanities.
- On September 28, 2010, Gordon-Reed received a MacArthur Fellowship. This award is often called a "genius grant." The MacArthur Foundation noted that her "persistent investigation into the life of an iconic American president has dramatically changed the course of Jeffersonian scholarship."
Gordon-Reed has also received other important fellowships, like a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 2020, she was named a University Professor at Harvard University. This is Harvard's highest honor for its faculty. In 2021, she was elected a corresponding fellow of the British Academy. In 2022, she was recognized as a distinguished teaching fellow by the Georgia Historical Society. This honor is for leaders in history who change how the public understands the past.
See Also
Images for kids
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Gordon-Reed in 2011
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Lee C. Bollinger, President of Columbia University, presents the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for History to Annette Gordon-Reed.
