Norris Hundley

Norris Cecil Hundley, Jr. (October 26, 1935 – April 28, 2013) was an American academic, historian, and writer, best known for his 1992 book, The Great Thirst, which details the history of water usage in California from 1770 to the 1990s. Both as a historian and an academic, Hundley was renowned for inventing the professional history of water rights in the Western United States

Early life Hundley was born on October 26, 1935, in Houston, Texas, as the eldest of six children of Norris and Helen Hundley. He then attended Whittier College, where he graduated in 1958, and later on, he received his Ph.D. in History from UCLA in 1963.

Apart from his work at the PHR, Hundley served as the president of the Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association from 1994 to 1995, the Chair of the UCLA Program on Mexico from 1982 to 1994, the director of the UCLA Latin American Center from 1989 to 1994 and from 1994 to 1997, and as 34th President of the Western History Association from 1994 to 1995.

Personal life In 1954, Norris Hundley met Carol Marie Beckquist when they were both students at San Gabriel Mission High School. They married on June 8, 1957, and raised two daughters. Hundley was Catholic.

Death Norris Hundley died in Montecito, California, on April 28, 2013, at the age of 77. He was survived by his wife, two daughters, six younger siblings, and six grandchildren.

Academic works Dividing the Waters: A Century of Controversy between the United States and Mexico (1966, trans. Spanish, 2000) Water and the West: The Colorado River Compact and the Politics of Water in the American West (1975) The Great Thirst: Californians and Water, 1770s-1990s (1992, rev. 2001) California: History of a Remarkable State (4th ed.; Prentice-Hall 1982)