Professor Heimert Dies at 70 in N.Y.

Noted professor of early American history and literature Alan E. Heimert '49, a mainstay on Harvard's campus for the last 50 years, died Monday night in New York City of a heart attack.

Heimert was 70 years old.

The Cabot professor of American literature and former master of Eliot House had been on leave this year, following a series of health problems over the past few years. Heimert suffered a stroke in 1997, the same year in which students awarded him the Levenson award for teaching excellence.

Two years before, the Modern Language Association gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award.

Heimert had been involved with the Harvard community since his days as an undergraduate.

He served as master of Eliot House from 1968 through 1991, in addition to chairing the English department, the history and literature concentration and the graduate program in American civilization at various times during his career.

"He was a role model of rigor and high expectations. He set a lofty standard and challenged students to do their best," said Lawrence Buell, Marquand professor of English and Heimert's longtime colleague.

Heimert enjoyed teaching undergraduates, especially in small settings, according to Daniel G. Donoghue, chair of the committee on degrees in history and literature.

"It was all of a piece--with his dedication to the quality of undergraduate life, intellectual quality and all the other things that go into the life," Donoghue said. "He sacrificed a lot to pursue that ideal."

Dirk M. Killen '82--the senior tutor in Pforzheimer House whose dissertation was advised by Heimert--recalled the Puritan scholar's devotion to Houses as the center of undergraduate education.

"He wanted the students and the teaching fellows to know that they were part of something larger than themselves, not to puff them up with pride, but to inspire them to equal or better the contributions of those that had gone before them," Killen wrote in an e-mail message.

Heimert's Life and Times

Heimert was born in Oak Park, Ill., on Nov. 10, 1928. His family soon moved to nearby Chicago and finally to suburban Elmhurst where he attended York Community High School.

Neither his mother nor his father received a college degree although his father completed two years of school before his own father's death forced him to earn a living for his family.

Heimert arrived at Harvard as an undergraduate in 1945. He wrote his senior thesis on Abraham Lincoln, a subject he returned to last year in an undergraduate seminar.

"He was very good at asking questions--perceptive and profound questions that helped him to get to know you, to know what you think and why you think it," said Joshua R. Carter '98-'01, a student in the Lincoln seminar.

After completing a master's degree at Columbia, Heimert returned to Harvard to receive a Ph.D in 1960. Heimert was married two years later in Appleton Chapel to Arline I. Grimes '59, whom he met when she was still an undergraduate.

Heimert then went on to serve as master of Eliot House from 1968 to 1991. He was succeeded by the current masters Stephen A. Mitchell, professor of Scandanavian literature and folklore, and Kristin L. Forsgard, but maintained an office in the House and taught a House seminar on the witches of Salem.

"He inspired great loyalty and spirit among the Eliot House community, and during his time there Eliot House and its inhabitants had a strong sense of place. That alone is not too shabby a legacy for any House master to leave behind," Mitchell wrote in an e-mail message.

"I have rarely had so much fun in my nearly two decades on the Harvard faculty--the man could reel off enormous stretches of sermons, prayers and other 17th-century materials," Mitchell added.

An Intense Instructor

Students and colleagues alike yesterday remembered Heimert for the intensity of his classes.

"He dared to do things that hardly any other Harvard professor would think of today, like glower at and castigate a student who hadn't done the requisite reading," Mitchell said.

Michael B. Fertik '00 remembers his one-on-one tutorial with Heimert last spring because he was surprised to find that such a well-established scholar was genuinely interested in his student's thoughts on Moby Dick.

"He read everything, but he [wanted] to stay fresh. He still challenged his own assumptions about a book, about which he had written a knock-out article," Fertik said.

"I count myself blissfully lucky to get to study with him before he finished his career," Fertik added.

Last year, Heimert also taught English 71, "The Literature of American Religion."

"He loved Jonathan Edwards and his theology. We would just talk about that forever, arguing about him as a thinker and as a theologian," said Candy G. Brown '92.

Brown was first a student of Heimert's in 1993 and maintained a close relationship since then, serving as a teaching fellow for the Lincoln seminar.

"He examined the personal, spiritual and intellectual levels of all those he studied. He forced his students to examine it on a deeper level," she said.

Several students also said that Heimert seriously influenced their careers.

"To use the Puritan vocabulary, he gave me my calling," said Andrew H. Delbanco '73, who wrote his doctoral dissertation under Heimert and is now a professor of the humanities at Columbia University.

"I had a general interest in literature, but thoughts of a career were vague. The literature of early America was remote and strange to me until Professor Heimert revealed its beauty and intricacy to me," Delbanco said.

Heimert is survived by his wife, his son Andrew and his daughter, Larisa.