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Allan Nevins (1890- 1971)
Allan Nevins was distinguished as a journalist, author, and history professor at Columbia University. In an effort to bring the "guild historians" together with "nonacademic historians," Nevins proposed the creation of a journal of popular history to the American Historical Association Council in 1938. After the Council rejected the idea, Nevins acted to create a separate organization, the Society of American Historians, "To promote literary distinction in historical writing." He also attacked the pedantry of many academic historians in the Saturday Review of Literature, which produced a sharp rift in the profession. Nevins own distinguished works include American States During and After the Revolution, 1775-79 (1924), the magisterial four-volume Ordeal of the Union (1947-71), and the two-volume Study in Power: John D. Rockefeller, Industrialist and Philanthropist (1953).