Alfred F. Young

Alfred Fabian "Al" Young (1925–2012) was an American historian. Young is regarded as a pioneer in the writing of the social history of the American Revolution and was a founding editor of the academic journal Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas.

Biography Early years

Alfred Fabian Young, known to family and friends as "Al," was born January 17, 1925, in New York City. He was the second son of Gerson Yungowitz, a Polish-born Jew who had grown up in London, and the former Fanny Denitzen, an East European émigré to America. The family surname was Americanized to Young after his father's arrival in America.

Young attended public schools, graduating from Jamaica High School in Jamaica, Queens at the age of 16, academically ranked 4th in his class of 400 students.

In 1952 Young married Marilyn Mills, with whom he ultimately raised three daughters.

After his retirement from teaching, Young took a position as a Senior Scholar in Residence at the Newberry Library in Chicago. Freed from the constraints of the classroom, Young managed to increase his literary productivity, releasing several essays collections and expanding his influential 1981 article on colonial shoemaker George Roberts Twelves Hewes into book form as The Shoemaker and the Tea Party: Memory and the American Revolution (1999).

Death and legacy

Al Young was stricken by his first heart attack in May 2012. His productive work as a working historian was thereby brought to an end.

Young died November 6, 2012, in Durham, North Carolina, following a second heart attack — this time fatal. Dissent: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 1968. Beyond the American Revolution: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism American Promise: A Compact History. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 1993. The Shoemaker and the Tea Party: Memory and the American Revolution. Boston: Beacon Press, 2000. Masquerade: The Life and Times of Deborah Sampson, Continental Soldier. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004. Liberty Tree: Ordinary People and the American Revolution. New York: New York University Press, 2006. Whose American Revolution Was It?: Historians Interpret the Founding. With Gregory H. Nobles. New York: New York University Press, 2011.

Edited volumes The American Revolution: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism. Editor. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 1976. We the People: Voices and Images of the New Nation. Editor, with Mary E. Janzen and Terry J. Fife. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 1992. Past Imperfect: Essays on History, Libraries, and the Humanities. Editor, with Lawrence W. Towner and Robert W. Karrow Jr. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. Revolutionary Founders: Rebels, Radicals, and Reformers in the Making of the Nation. Editor, with Gary B. Nash and Ralph Raphael. New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2011.

Journal articles "George Roberts Twelves Hewes (1742–1840): A Boston Shoemaker and the Memory of the American Revolution," William and Mary Quarterly, vol. 38, no. 4 (Oct. 1981), pp. 561–623. "An Outsider and the Progress of a Career in History," William and Mary Quarterly, vol. 52, no. 3 (July 1995), pp. 499–512.

Footnotes