All Scholars

KATZ, Solomon

  • Solomon Katz
  • Date of Birth: June 10, 1909
  • Born City: Baltimore
  • Born State/Country: MD
  • Parents: Saul & Sophia Gelber K.
  • Date of Death: December 23, 1989
  • Death City: Seattle
  • Death State/Country: WA
  • Married: Marcia Geller, September 6, 1931.
  • Education:

    A.B., Cornell, 1930; Ph.D., 1933; George C. Boldt traveling fellow, Sorbonne, 1932-3; ACLS Fellow, 1934-5.
  • Dissertation:

    “The Jews in Visigothic and Frankish Kingdoms of Spain and Gaul” (Cornell, 1933; expanded version published Cambridge, MA: Medieval Academy of America, 1937; repr. 1970)
  • Professional Experience:

    Asst. prof. Greek, U. of Oregon, 1935-6; instr. to prof. history, U. of Washington, 1936-79; chair of dept., 1954-60; dean, College of Arts & Sciences, 1960-6; provost, 1965-75; vice-president academic affairs, 1967-75; univ. historian, 1975-9; 1st Lt. to major, USAAF, 1942-6 (Bronze Star); Fulbright research scholar, France, 1952-3; Guggenheim Fellow, Italy, 1953-4; Danforth grantee, Europe, 1970.
  • Publications:

    “Pope Gregory the Great and the Jews,” Jewish Quarterly Review 24 (1933) 113-36; “The Gracchi: An Essay in Interpretation,” CJ 38 (1942) 65-82; “Even Classicists are Odd,” CJ 43 (1948) 333-7; The Decline of Rome and the Rise of Medieval Europe (Ithaca, NY: Cornell U. Press, 1955); “The Illness of Caligula,” CW 65 (1972) 223-5; “Caligula's Illness Again,” CW 70 (1977) 451; Vergil's Pastoral Mode. Dialectical Thought in the Bucolics (Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt U. Press, 1982); “Issues in the Separation of Judaism and Christianity,” JBL 103 (1984) 43-76; The Origins and Ancient History of Wine, with Patrick E. McGovern & Stuart J. Fleming (Philadelphia: Gordon & Breech, 1995).

    Papers:  Archives West, U. of Washington libraries, Special Collection.
  • Notes:

    Solomon Katz was a distinguished historian, university administrator, and supporter of non-profit cause in Seattle. His parents were immigrants from Austria. After receiving his doctorate, he found that jobs during the Depression were rare. He spent a year at the Sorbonne on a fellowship and received support for research in Europe and the Middle East from the ACLS. The two years allowed him to build upon the finding of his dissertation. The groundbreaking research would be published by the Medieval Academy of America in 1937 and reprinted in 1970. Katz headed west to the University of Oregon, shortly to take a position in the history department at the University of Washington, which he served for 53 years. His research and teaching specialty centered on the last years of the Roman Empire, the rise of the Byzantine Empire and the Early Middle Ages. 

    While working in Europe Katz witnessed the rise and the cruelties of the Nazis and when war broke out he joined the Army Air Force Intelligence where he rose to the rank of major by war’s end.  

    Katz became an effective chair of his department in 1954, then chair of the faculty senate the following year. When the President Henry Schmitz (1892-1965) refused to allow J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904-67) to speak on campus, Katz spoke forcefully against Schmitz, sparking a faculty vote to invite Oppenheimer, but the president nevertheless refused to invite him leading to a period in which the University was seen as opposed to academic freedom.

    Under a new administration, Katz’s superb work in 1958 heading a committee to standardize admissions across the University led president Charles E. Odegaard (1911-99) to name him dean of his college. In 1965 Odegaard named Katz Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, in which high-profile post he began to be asked to serve on boards of local non-profits. By the time Katz left the administration in 1975, he was a major figure in charitable and cultural affairs in Seattle. When he returned to teaching he published a volume on Virgil’s Eclogues and a number of articles.     
  • Sources:

    WhAm 46 (1990-1) 1732; Who’s Who in World Jewry (Baltimore & New York:Who’s Who in World Jewry, 1987) 276. 
  • Author: Ward Briggs