Civil war scholar and Pulitzer Prize winner Mark E. Neely Jr. will discuss "The Civil War and American Political Culture" at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday (April 4) in Slayter Auditorium at Denison University. This Sharp Lecture Series convocation is free and open to the public and a reception will follow the talk.

Neely won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize in history for his bookThe Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties. The book also won the Bell I. Wiley Prize. Among his other books areThe Last Best Hope of Earth: Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of AmericaandSouthern Rights: Political Prisoners and the Myth of Confederate Constitutionalism. His fifth book,The Union Divided: Party Conflict in the Civil War North, is due out from the Harvard University Press this year.

Neely earned both his bachelor and doctoral degrees from Yale University. He served as director of The Lincoln Museum in Ft. Wayne (Ind.) for 20 years (1972-92) and also taught at St. Louis University before joining the faculty at Pennsylvania State University in 1998 where he is the McCabe-Greer Professor of Civil War History. Neely has served as the president of the Indiana Association of Historians and of the Society of Indiana Archivists. He also has served as a board member of the Abraham Lincoln Association and on the advisory boards of the Ulysses S. Grant Association, the Journal of Illinois History and the Civil War History journal.

The Sharp Lecture Series was established in honor of Donald Eugene Sharp, a 1952 Denison graduate, by his son John Sharp in recognition of their shared interest in American history. A bank consultant, Donald Sharp lives in Bronxville, N.Y., with his wife, Phyllis (Stevens) Sharp, also a 1952 Denison graduate. The fund brings distinguished American historians to Denison.

"Once again, the Sharp Lecture Series allows us to bring a distinguished Civil War historian to Denison. Neely is one of the most prolific and distinguished Civil War historians writing today," said Mitchell Snay, chair of the Denison history department and lecture coordinator.

About Denison:

Denison University, founded in 1831, is an independent, residential liberal arts institution located in Granville, Ohio. A highly selective college enrolling 2,100 full-time undergraduate students from all 50 states and dozens of foreign countries, Denison is a place where innovative faculty and motivated students collaborate in rigorous scholarship, civic engagement and the cultivation of independent thinking.

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