Photo: Miller Center / CC BY 2.0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
My Take
Leffler commands my genuine respect as one of the foremost historians of the Cold War. A Preponderance of Power, his study of the Truman administration and national security, earned the Bancroft Prize, and his work on the soul of the era took the George Louis Beer Prize too. From Brooklyn to Ohio State to a professorship at the University of Virginia, he built a career on the unglamorous, exhausting labor of wrestling vast archives into coherent narrative. We learn from the past only because rigorous minds like his keep re-examining it. I hold this kind of patient scholarship in the highest regard.
Overview
Melvyn Paul Leffler (born May 31, 1945) is an American historian and educator, currently Edward Stettinius Professor of History at the University of Virginia. He is the winner of numerous awards, including the Bancroft Prize for his book A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration and the Cold War, and the American Historical Association’s George Louis Beer Prize for his book For the Soul o…
Summary adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- Melvyn P. Leffler
- Name (Japanese)
- メルヴィン・レフラー
- Reading
- めるゔぃん・れふらー
- Born
- May 31, 1945 (age 81)
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Gemini / Rooster
- Origin
- Brooklyn, New York, United States
- Blood type
- Private
- Height
- Private
- Agency
- Private
- Occupation
- historian
2. Background
- Elementary school
- Private
- Junior high
- Private
- High school
- Private
- University
- Ohio State University
Awards & achievements
- 1993 Bancroft Prize
- 2008 George Louis Beer Prize
3. Relationships
- Spouse
- Private
- Children
- Private
- Parents
- Private
- Siblings
- Private
4. Personality
Motto
Private
6. Links
Historian — see all → · More people from United States →
7. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
- 2026-06-02
Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public items are marked "Private / Unknown". English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.