William Bell Clark (September 26, 1889 – October 31, 1968) was an American advertising executive and self-taught naval historian, specializing in the period of the

American Revolution The American Revolution (1765–1783) was a colonial rebellion and war of independence in which the Thirteen Colonies broke from British America, British rule to form the United States of America. The revolution culminated in the American ...

, 1775-1783.

Early life and education

Born in

Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania Mechanicsburg is a Borough (Pennsylvania), borough in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, United States. The borough is west of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Harrisburg. It is part of the Harrisburg–Carlisle metropolitan statistical area. As of the ...

, William Bell Clark was the son of William Patterson Bell and Kate Stees Bell. He graduated from Harrisburg Technical School (Pennsylvania) in 1907 and married Grace Mildred Wrigley on November 5, 1915, with whom he had two sons: William Bell Clark, Jr., and Donald Wrigley Clark.

Professional and writing career

From 1907 to 1919, he worked in the newspaper business in

Harrisburg Harrisburg ( ; ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), U.S. commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat, seat of Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, Dauphin County. With a population of 50, ...

and

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

. He served as Assistant Secretary of the Pennsylvania War History Commission, 1919-1921. In 1921, he moved to

Evanston, Illinois Evanston is a city in Cook County, Illinois, United States, situated on the North Shore (Chicago), North Shore along Lake Michigan. A suburb of Chicago, Evanston is north of Chicago Loop, downtown Chicago, bordered by Chicago to the south, Skok ...

, and joined the N. W. Ayer & Son Advertising Agency, rising to be vice president in 1939 and later, president. Although his first book was on military history, his work with the Pennsylvania War Commission from 1919 sparked his initial interest in naval affairs. He wrote several biographies of American naval captains, including John Barry, Nicholas Biddle,

Lambert Wickes Lambert Wickes (1735 – October 1, 1777) was a captain in the Continental Navy during the American Revolutionary War. Revolutionary activities Wickes was born sometime in 1735 in Kent County, Province of Maryland. His family home, Wickliffe, ...

, and John Young during the American Revolution, which were published by prominent academic presses, such as the

Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day and Clarence Day, grandsons of Benjamin Day, and became a department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and ope ...

and

Louisiana State University Press The Louisiana State University Press (LSU Press) is a university press at Louisiana State University. Founded in 1935, it publishes works of scholarship as well as general interest books. LSU Press is a member of the Association of University Pres ...

. In the process of this research and writing, Clark developed a deep knowledge of the archival resources for this general period in naval history and made numerous careful transcripts of documents. As a result of this in the late 1950s, Clark's work came to the attention of the Director of Naval History, Rear Admiral Ernest M. Eller at the Naval History Division of the Navy Department (now the

Naval Historical Center The Naval History and Heritage Command, formerly the Naval Historical Center, is an Echelon II command responsible for the preservation, analysis, and dissemination of U.S. naval history and heritage located at the historic Washington Navy Yard ...

) and the head of the Early History Branch in that office, Dr. William J. Morgan. With the advice of the

Secretary of the Navy The Secretary of the Navy (SECNAV) is a statutory officer () and the head (chief executive officer) of the Department of the Navy, a military department within the United States Department of Defense. On March 25, 2025, John Phelan was confirm ...

's advisory sub-committee on naval history, Clark was appointed the first editor of the U.S. Navy's multi-volume documentary series on ''Naval Documents of the American Revolution,'' assisted by Morgan and his staff in the Early History Branch. Clark died while the fourth volume was in the course of publication, but left rough drafts for the first ten volumes. He was succeeded as editor and his work continued by Dr. William J. Morgan, who in turn was succeeded by Dr. William S. Dudley, and then by Dr. Michael J. Crawford. A Republican and a Presbyterian, Clark was also a member of the

Naval Historical Foundation The Naval Historical Foundation was a nonprofit organization founded in 1926 and disbanded in 2022. It had a broad mission to preserve and promote the naval history of the United States by supporting official maritime history programs and institut ...

, the

Historical Society of Pennsylvania The Historical Society of Pennsylvania is a historic research facility headquartered on Locust Street in Center City Philadelphia. It is a repository for millions of historic items ranging across rare books, scholarly monographs, family chron ...

, the Pennsylvania Genealogical Society, and served as vice president of the Illinois chapter of the

Sons of the American Revolution The Sons of the American Revolution (SAR), formally the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution (NSSAR), is a federally chartered patriotic organization. The National Society, a nonprofit corporation headquartered in Louisvi ...

. Clark's personal small 170 document collection of original manuscript material, the bulk relating to the 1770-1794 period, with some documents as late as 1950, is in the Manuscript Division at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

Published works

*''The History of the 79th Division, A.E.F.'' (1922) *''When the u-boats came to America'' (1929, 2005) *''Lambert Wickes, sea raider and diplomat; the story of a naval captain of the revolution'' (1932) *''Gallant John Barry, 1745-1803; the story of a naval hero of two wars'' (1938) *''Captain Dauntless, the story of Nicholas Biddle of the Continental Navy'' (1949) *''The first Saratoga; being the saga of John Young and his sloop-of-war'' (1953) *''Ben Franklin’s privateers; a naval epic of the American Revolution'' (1956, 1969) *''George Washington’s Navy; being an account of His Excellency’s fleet in New England waters'' (1960) *''Naval documents of the American Revolution'' edited by William Bell Clark; with a foreword by President

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the first Roman Catholic and youngest person elected p ...

and an introduction by Ernest McNeill Eller, vol 1 (1964) - Vol 4 (1969).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, William Bell American naval historians American male non-fiction writers 1889 births 1968 deaths American marketing people Historians of the American Revolution Members of the Sons of the American Revolution People from Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania Historians from Pennsylvania 20th-century American male writers