// Workers AI · dad joke modeWho's Samuel Hazzard Cross? A crossing guard with a hazard pay.
Samuel Hazzard Cross (1891−14 October 1946) was an expert in German and Slavic culture, particularly medieval Russian literature.[1]: p. 286 fn 26
Education
[edit]Cross graduated from Harvard with two degrees: a BA in 1912 and a PhD in 1916.[2] His studies also took him to the universities of Gratz, Freiburg, Berlin, and Leningrad.[2]
Career
[edit]Following his studies, from 1917–20 Cross served in the American Army, on the American Commission to Negotiate Peace, and at the American Embassy in Belgium. From 1925–26 he both held a lectureship in European trade and economics at Georgetown University and led the U. S. Department of Commerce in Europe.[2]
In 1927, Cross was appointed to Harvard University,[2] first teaching German.[1]: p. 286 fn 26 In 1930 he became an associate of Lowell House and also chairman of the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures.[2]
Cross was, however, committed to developing Slavic studies both at Harvard and in the USA more generally, eventually becoming professor of Slavic languages and literature at Harvard.[1]: p. 286 fn 26 Among his students was Anne McCaffrey, who went on to become a major science-fiction author.[3] Cross was managing editor of the American series of The Slavonic and East European Review;[1]: 289 his works included Slavic Civilization through the Ages (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1948), published posthumously and characterised by one reviewer as "certainly the best general introduction to the Slavic studies so far available in English".[4]
Personal life
[edit]Cross married in 1918 and had three daughters.[2] He died suddenly, of a heart attack on 14 October 1946.[2]
Legacy
[edit]After his death, Harvard established the Samuel Hazzard Cross Chair of Slavic Languages and Literatures, first filled, in January, 1950 by Roman Jakobson.[5]: 98
References
[edit]- 1 2 3 4 Zeide, Alla (2012). "The Russian Review: The Story in History". Ab Imperio. 2012 (4): 279–306. doi:10.1353/imp.2012.0134. ISSN 2164-9731.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Slavic Scholar Samuel Cross Dies Suddenly | News | The Harvard Crimson". www.thecrimson.com. Retrieved 2025-11-05.
- ↑ Robin Roberts, Anne McCaffrey: A Life with Dragons (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2007), p. 69.
- ↑ Vernadsky, George (1948). "Slavic Civilization through the Ages. Samuel Hazzard Cross , Leonid I. Strakhovsky". Speculum. 23 (3): 482–484. doi:10.2307/2848438. ISSN 0038-7134.
- ↑ Baran, Henryk (2021-08-11). "Roman Jakobson and American Slavic Studies: The First Postwar Decade". Roczniki Humanistyczne. 69 (7): 91–116. doi:10.18290/rh21697-7. ISSN 2544-5200.