John Herman Randall III

Dr. John Herman Randall III, the son of Philosopher John Herman Randall Jr., was Professor Emeritus of English at Boston College. He graduated with a B.A. in pre-med from Columbia University in 1944. In his wartime-abridged senior year, 1943, he applied to Columbia University’s medical school. Randall did not become a physician and, after a troubled period, he instead turned to literature, which became his true calling. He received an M.A. from the University of California at Berkeley in 1950. There he came to specialize in twentieth century American literature and American Studies.

His Californian period came to an end when the state imposed a loyalty oath on all teachers and graduate assistants at the University. Randall was not intensely political, but along with numerous others he refused to sign the loyalty oath, which was a cutting edge of liberal resistance to the then resurgent reaction of the House Un-American Activities Committee and McCarthy. He attended Yale University from 1950-51; and then the University of Minnesota, where he earned a Ph.D. A version of his doctoral dissertation, The Landscape and the Looking Glass: Willa Cather’s Search for Value, was published in 1960.

His first academic appointment was at Wellesley College, and he joined the faculty of Boston College in 1961. After his retirement from full-time teaching in 1989, he continued to teach part time at Boston College until 1998. Boston College honored him with The John H. Randall III Award, presented annually to the undergraduate student judged to have written the best essay on some aspect of American literature or culture during the academic year.

Source: RootsWeb