Frank
L. Klement, who died in 1994 at the age of 86, received his PhD
in History from the University of Wisconsin in 1946. He taught
briefly at Lake Forest College and at Eau Claire State Teachers
College before joining the history department at Marquette University
in 1948. Before his retirement twenty-seven years later with the
rank of Professor Emeritus, Frank served as department chair from
1956-1958 and received the Award for Teaching Excellence in 1965.
He also served as President of Phi Alpha Theta, the International
Honor Society for History (1973-1974), as President of the Lincoln
Fellowship of Wisconsin (1960), in many official capacities for
the Civil War Round Table of Milwaukee, and on numerous editorial
boards and national committees.
Prof.
Klement's scholarship focused on the Civil War era, particularly
on northern dissenters. He authored over fifty articles and chapters
in books and dozens of book reviews, but his best known works
are The Copperheads in the Middle West (1960), The
Limits of Dissent: Clement L. Vallandigham and the Civil War
(1970), and Dark Lanterns: Secret Political Societies, Conspiracies,
and Treason Trials in the Civil War (1984).
These
well-received books placed northern dissenters in their economic
and political contexts and debunked exaggerated notions of their
treasonous designs; this was truly an "alternative view"
of an important aspect of the history of the sectional conflict.
The Klement Lectures will continue to honor the man and the scholar,
by presenting the work of historians who continue the K1ement
tradition of offering alternative views of the Civil War era.
