Professor of History James Kloppenberg: "As someone who came of age during the Vietnam War, I decided I wanted to change the American culture. And I put my bet on education." Photo by Kris Snibbe

As a boy growing up in Denver, Colo., Jim Kloppenberg played with toy cowboys and Indians, redcoats and revolutionaries, G.I.’s and Nazis.

On week s, he went to the Colorado State Historical Museum, where he stood staring at the dioramas of Plains Indians pitching camp or hunting buffalo.

In 6th grade he wrote an essay called "Up to Now." He described his family, what he did for fun, and what he liked best in school.

History.

In the last paragraph, he wrote: "I hope to go to college and I hope to teach history."

Professor of History James Kloppenberg seems to have been destined for his profession. But what began as a child’s fascination has grown into a belief that teaching history is an act of social reform.

"As someone who came of age during the Vietnam War, I decided I wanted to help change American culture," he says. "And I put my bet on education."

Kloppenberg grew up in a family that ran a sheet-metal shop. He and his brothers were the first members of the ext ed family to go to college. Kloppenberg got his B.A. in history from Dartmouth and a Ph.D. from Stanford. He taught intellectual history at Brandeis for 18 years before coming to Harvard.

Kloppenberg calls himself a pragmatist. "Knowledge is there to enable us to do things, rather than have some sacred status, as something that we can’t challenge," he says. He tempered this belief in a surprising forge – the Catholic church – and refined it during the anti-Vietnam war movement.

As a choirboy from 6th to 8th grade, Kloppenberg sang Gregorian chant every summer morning. As an altar boy, he lit the candles and rang the bells; he washed the priest’s hands and helped distribute the Eucharist.

"These rituals can seem so bizarre, and yet there was a purpose behind them. And to teach the significance of them" – he trained other altar boys – "you had to understand the philosophical basis for them."

This questioning attitude intensified after Vatican II, the liberalization of Catholic doctrine under Pope John XXIII. "All of a sudden the windows were open – all ideas were up for discussion," he says.

"I was always interested in abstract questions. I asked questions about free will and determinism, free will and obligation. Why we must do what we do, and what it means to be responsible."

He brought this spirit of inquiry to college, where the anti-war movement, then just getting under way, forced him to further examine his beliefs. Kloppenberg became active in the movement. He lobbied Congress and organized Dartmouth students to travel to Washington to protest America’s bombings of Vietnam.

He also renewed his childhood resolve to teach history.

Kloppenberg’s fri s and colleagues attest to a kind of rock-solid decency in Kloppenberg.

"He’s an extraordinarily principled and caring person," says Tim Peltason, professor of English at Wellesley. "He’s very scrupulous, demanding of himself and others. But he’s very good-humored, very tuned in to all the important things in life."

"He’s a humble guy," says Jonathan Hansen, lecturer in Lecturer in Harvard's Social Studies Committee. "He’s immensely gifted, but he’s self-deprecating."

"He believes strongly in a flourishing civic culture with democracy at its center," says David Hall, professor of religious studies at Harvard Divinity School. "He’s a first-rate citizen of the university."

Indeed, Kloppenberg says, "democracy has been at the center of my interests from the beginning – to break down hierarchies and to help move the culture in the direction of equality."

His first book, Uncertain Victory, was an ambitious study of the origins of social democracy in Europe and America, from 1870 to 1920. Unlike many intellectual historians, Kloppenberg writes about American thought in a global context. For the past 12 years, he has worked on a massive study of democracy in Europe and America since the 17th century. He also is writing a book on William James, and one called Thinking Historically, about the uses of history in other disciplines.

On his first day teaching at Harvard, students, wet with rain, crowded into his class, Social Thought in Modern America.

He spoke deliberately and gestured precisely. He clasped his wedding ring while he talked (he’s been married to his high-school sweetheart for 27 years).

But he was more like George Washington than King George; and this class was a mini-republic, a training ground for good citizenship. Class participation forms the largest part of the students’ grade. After the first class, he told the students, he will lecture for only 10 to 15 minutes at a time. The rest will be discussion.

He made an ironic remark to the students about the elevated lecture platform and the seats bolted to the floor, training students’ eyes on the professor.

"I’ve been a critic of Harvard for a long time because of distinctions I see separating senior from junior faculty, and senior faculty from undergraduates," says Kloppenberg. "I want very much to contribute to shrinking these gaps."

Kloppenberg also wants to work toward smaller classes and an interdisciplinary approach to learning. "The people inside the History Department and especially Jeremy Knowles convinced me there are people here committed to making the kinds of changes I’m interested in."

"One doesn’t have to choose between commitment to the culture and commitment to the possibility of changing the culture," he says, in another context. "The oldest tradition of America is the tradition of experimentation."

Outside the University, Kloppenberg has an active civic life. He has coached children’s soccer, baseball, and basketball for years. He is president of his parish’s pastoral council in Wellesley. He has been a guest speaker at elementary and secondary schools in the Boston and Wellesley areas for almost 15 years.

He has managed to both retain faith in the institutions of his church and state and remain vigilant that they live up to their ideals. And there is something in him, still, of the boy looking at dioramas in the history museum. He’s still intensely excited by what we can learn about ourselves and the past through careful scrutiny.

How would he like history to remember him?

"As someone who was a good teacher. And who helped people understand the history of the United States more critically."