Sydney Eckman Ahlstrom (1919–1984) was an American historian. He was a

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the w ...

professor and a specialist in the religious history of the United States.

Biography

Ahlstrom was born on December 16, 1919, in Cokato,

Minnesota Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over t ...

, the son of Joseph T. Ahlstrom (1878–1942) and Selma (Eckman) Ahlstrom (1881–1976), who were

Swedish-American Swedish Americans ( sv, svenskamerikaner) are Americans of Swedish ancestry. They include the 1.2 million Swedish immigrants during 1865–1915, who formed tight-knit communities, as well as their descendants and more recent immigrants. Today, ...

Lutherans Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched ...

. He graduated from

Gustavus Adolphus College Gustavus Adolphus College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in St. Peter, Minnesota. It was founded in 1862 by Swedish Americans led by Eric Norelius and is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Gustavus gets its name ...

St. Peter ) (Simeon, Simon) , birth_date = , birth_place = Bethsaida, Gaulanitis, Syria, Roman Empire , death_date = Between AD 64–68 , death_place = probably Vatican Hill, Rome, Italia, Roman Empire , parents = John (or Jonah; Jona) , occupation ...

, Minnesota, with a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...

degree in 1941, and served in the US Army during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

. He earned a master's degree at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

in 1946 and a

Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

degree at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

in 1952. He was a

Fulbright fellow The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people of ...

at the

University of Strasbourg The University of Strasbourg (french: Université de Strasbourg, Unistra) is a public research university located in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, with over 52,000 students and 3,300 researchers. The French university traces its history to the ea ...

, France, and an instructor at Harvard before joining Yale in 1954. In 1973 he received the

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

in category Philosophy and Religion for ''A Religious History of the American People'' (1972)."National Book Awards – 1973"

National Book Foundation The National Book Foundation (NBF) is an American nonprofit organization established, "to raise the cultural appreciation of great writing in America". Established in 1989 by National Book Awards, Inc.,Edwin McDowell. "Book Notes: 'The Joy Luc ...

. Retrieved 2012-03-08. He was elected a fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

in 1978. In 1979 he was awarded The Christian Century Award for the Decade's Most Outstanding Book on Religion. At the time of his retirement from Yale in 1984 he held the position of Samuel Knight Professor of American History and Modern Religious History. He died on July 3, 1984, in

New Haven New Haven is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound in New Haven County, Connecticut and is part of the New York City metropolitan area. With a population of 134,023 ...

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York (state), New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the ...

Bibliography

Books

* '' A Religious History of the American People'' (1972; 2nd ed. 2004) * ''The American frontier and the Protestant missionary response'' (1960)

Edited volumes

* ''An American reformation: A documentary history of Unitarian Christianity'', edited with Jonathan S. Carey (1998) * ''Theology in America: The major Protestant voices from Puritanism to Neo-Orthodoxy'' (1967)

Representative articles

* "The Scottish Philosophy and American Theology," ''Church History,'' Vol. 24, No. 3 (Sep., 1955), pp. 257–27
in JSTOR
* "Continental Influence on American Christian Thought Since World War I," ''Church History,'' Vol. 27, No. 3 (Sept 1958), pp. 256–27
in JSTOR
* "Theology and the Present-Day Revival," ''Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science'' Vol. 332, Religion in American Society (Nov., 1960), pp. 20–3
in JSTOR
* "Thomas Hooker: Puritanism and Democratic Citizenship: A Preliminary Inquiry into Some Relationships of Religion and American Civic Responsibility," ''Church History,'' Vol. 32, No. 4 (Dec., 1963), pp. 415–43
in JSTOR
* "The Radical Turn in Theology and Ethics: Why It Occurred in 1960s," ''Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science'' Vol. 387, The Sixties: Radical Change in American Religion (Jan., 1970), pp. 1–1
in JSTOR
* "Religion, Revolution and the Rise of Modern Nationalism: Reflections on the American Experience," ''Church History,'' Vol. 44, No. 4 (Dec., 1975), pp. 492–50
in JSTOR
* "The Religious Dimension of American Aspirations," ''Review of Politics'' vol. 38, No. 3, Bicentennial Issue (Jul., 1976), pp. 332–34
in JSTOR
* "The Romantic Religious Revolution and the Dilemmas of Religious History The Romantic Religious Revolution and the Dilemmas of Religious History," ''Church History,'' Vol. 46, No. 2 (Jun., 1977), pp. 149–17
in JSTOR
* "The Problem of the History of Religion in America," ''Church History,'' Vol. 57, Supplement: Centennial Issue (1988), pp. 127–13
in JSTOR

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ahlstrom, Sydney 1919 births 1984 deaths 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers 20th-century American male writers 20th-century Lutherans American historians of religion American Lutherans American people of Swedish descent Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Gustavus Adolphus College alumni Harvard University alumni Historians from Minnesota Lutheran scholars National Book Award winners People from Cokato, Minnesota Presidents of the American Society of Church History University of Minnesota alumni Yale University faculty United States Army personnel of World War II