American · 1917–2016
William H. McNeill was a Canadian-born American historian who spent most of his career at the University of Chicago, where he taught from 1947 to 1987. He wrote about world history at a time when most historians studied single nations or regions. His first major book, The Rise of the West (1963), traced the history of human societies as a connected whole and won the National Book Award. Plagues and Peoples (1976) argued that disease shaped the course of empires and migrations, and it helped create the field of disease history. He also wrote Keeping Together in Time, on dance and drill, and a memoir, The Pursuit of Truth. He served as president of the American Historical Association in 1985. McNeill died in 2016 at the age of 98. His work made world history a standard subject in universities and schools.