Louis R. Gottschalk

Louis Reichenthal Gottschalk (February 21, 1899 – June 23, 1975 ) was an American historian, an expert on the Marquis de Lafayette and the French Revolution. He taught at the University of Chicago, where he was the Gustavus F. and Ann M. Swift Distinguished Service Professor of History.

Early life and education He was born Louis Gottschalk, the sixth of eight children of Morris and Anna (née Krystal) Gottschalk, Jewish immigrants in Brooklyn from Poland. He taught briefly at the University of Illinois, but resigned in protest in 1927 after a friend and colleague in the history department was fired as part of an attempt by the university administration to abolish tenure. and the second president of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies.

Awards and honors Gottschalk was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1928 and 1954,

A series of lectures is named for him at the University of Louisville. The annual $1000 Louis Gottschalk Prize, named in his honor, is given by the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies to the author of "an outstanding historical or critical study".

Works Gottschalk's papers are held at the University of Chicago. He books include seven volumes on the Marquis de Lafayette He later married Fruma Kasden, in 1930; they had two sons.