DeGroot, Gerard J. 1955-

PERSONAL:

Born 1955. Education: Whitman College, B.A.; University of Edinburgh, Ph.D.

ADDRESSES:

E-mail—gjdg@st-and.ac.uk.

CAREER:

Writer, educator. University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, Scotland, professor of modern history.

WRITINGS:

NONFICTION

Blighty: British Society in the Era of the Great War, Longman (Harlow, England), 1996.

Student Protest: The Sixties and After, Longman (Harlow, England), 1998.

A Noble Cause? America and the Vietnam War, Longman (Harlow, England), 2000.

(Editor, with C. Peniston-Bird) A Soldier and a Woman: Sexual Integration in the Military, Longman (Harlow, England), 2000.

The First World War, Palgrave Macmillan (London, England), 2001.

The Bomb: A Life, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA), 2004.

Dark Side of the Moon: The Magnificent Madness of the American Lunar Quest, New York University Press (New York, NY), 2006.

Also author of Douglas Haig, 1861-1928, 1988; Liberal Crusader: The Life of Sir Archibald Sinclair, 1993; and Military Miscellany, 1997. Contributor of articles to journals and books.

SIDELIGHTS:

A professor of modern history in Scotland, Gerard J. DeGroot has authored numerous books on various subjects in twentieth-century history, from the First World War to the Vietnam War, and from the creation of the atomic bomb to America's race for the moon. In his 1996 title, Blighty: British Society in the Era of the Great War, and again in the 2001 publication The First World War, DeGroot views that enormous conflict through the lens of modern research. Reviewing Blighty in the Contemporary Review, James Munson called the book "well researched," and further noted that "the war, [DeGroot] argues, did not break down ‘class barriers’ but used them." For Paul Crook, writing in the Australian Journal of Politics and History, Blighty was a "compact social history of Britain during World War I." Crook felt, however, that "there is a deal of overclaiming and publicity hype in its claim to revisionist originality."

DeGroot examines a later conflict in A Noble Cause? America and the Vietnam War, which Contemporary Review contributor Michael F. Hopkins found to be a "brisk, clear, engaging account based on a wide range of secondary sources and some primary materials." As Hopkins further noted, for DeGroot that war was "a great illuminating failure," for which the "world is a better place." Reviewing the same work in H-Net Review, John McNay felt that while DeGroot's "sometimes acerbic style entertains, many such observations are often left to stand with little evidence offered for such sweeping pronouncements." McNay further pointed out, though, "On the positive side, [these observations] often cause the reader to think and to reconsider preconceptions."

DeGroot presents a comprehensive history of the atomic bomb in his The Bomb: A Life, a "wry biography," according to USA Today contributor Michael Jacobs. DeGroot covers aspects of creating the bomb from the Manhattan Project to German and Soviet attempts to create such a super weapon and to the first use of the bomb in Japan. Jacobs went on to note: "DeGroot reveals everything you ever wanted to know about nuclear weapons, including things you were too terrified to ask. And he has fun doing it." Similarly, Jacob Darwin Hamblin, writing in the Canadian Journal of History, noted, "DeGroot's remarkable accomplishment is in marshalling many different aspects of the atomic age into a single volume." A Publishers Weekly reviewer found the account "bal- anced and accessible," while a Kirkus Reviews critic called it "a splendid distillation of nuclear history, and just the thing for students of the modern age."

In Dark Side of the Moon: The Magnificent Madness of the American Lunar Quest, DeGroot offers a further revisionist interpretation of a major modern historical event. Writing in the California Literary Review, De-Groot summed up the thesis of his book: "The lunar mission was a $35 billion happy pill administered to a generation of depressed Americans. There's no doubt that the 1960s were tough years, but as a cure for depression, surely Valium would have been cheaper." A Publishers Weekly contributor felt that "DeGroot writes with 20-20 hindsight, and his sarcasm may put off some readers, although it makes for entertaining reading." On a more positive note, Booklist writer Jerry Eberle praised the author for his skepticism: "DeGroot revisits the question that should have been fully explored the last time around: Why?" Likewise, a Kirkus Reviews critic found Dark Side of the Moon to be a "top-flight debunking [that] takes all the air out of the moon race."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Australian Journal of Politics and History, March, 1998, Paul Crook, review of Blighty: British Society in the Era of the Great War, p. 143.

Booklist, September 1, 2006, Jerry Eberle, review of Dark Side of the Moon: The Magnificent Madness of the American Lunar Quest, p. 31.

Canadian Journal of History, December, 2005, Jacob Darwin Hamblin, review of The Bomb: A Life, p. 601.

Contemporary Review, May, 1997, James Munson, review of Blighty, p. 270; May, 2002, Michael F. Hopkins, "Historians Look at Kennedy's Wars," review of A Noble Cause? America and the Vietnam War, p. 305.

Kirkus Reviews, January 1, 2005, review of The Bomb, p. 31; September 1, 2006, review of Dark Side of the Moon, p. 885.

Library Journal, January 1, 2005, Daniel K. Blewett, review of The Bomb, p. 127.

Minerva, spring, 2001, Donna M. Dean, review of A Soldier and a Woman: Sexual Integration in the Military, p. 42.

Publishers Weekly, January 3, 2005, review of The Bomb, p. 46; August 28, 2006, review of The Dark Side of the Moon, p. 41.

Science News, May 14, 2005, review of The Bomb, p. 319.

USA Today, April 21, 2005, Michael Jacobs, review of The Bomb, p. 5D.

ONLINE

California Literary Review,http://www.calitreview.com/ (December 4, 2006), Gerard J. DeGroot, "America's Race to the Moon."

Harvard University Press Web site,http://www.hup.harvard.edu/ (March 4, 2007), "Gerard J. DeGroot."

Humanities and Social Sciences Online: H-Net Reviews,http://www.h-net.msu.edu/ (March 4, 2007), John McNay, review of A Noble Cause?

History News Network (HNN),http://www.hnn.us/ (August 26, 2005), Richard B. Speed, review of The Bomb.

University of St. Andrews History Department Faculty Page,http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/ (March 4, 2007), "Gerard DeGroot."