Fred Lukermann

1921 - 2009

Fred E. Lukermann, professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota and a former Dean of the College of Liberal Arts, died on September 1, 2009. A Minneapolis native, born December 9, 1921, Lukermann graduated

from Roosevelt High School in 1940 and entered the University of Minnesota the following fall. He returned to the University after serving in the U.S. Army, earning B.S., M.A. and PhD degrees. Lukermann joined the University of Minnesota’s Geography Department in the early 1950s and helped that program achieve steadily greater national and international recognition. As department chair, Lukermann promoted a pervasive spirit of wide-ranging and creative intellectual inquiry. Lukermann assumed several leadership roles at the University of Minnesota in addition to his term as chair of the Geography Department. He was instrumental in establishing the Departments of African American & African Studies, American Indian Studies, Chicano Studies, the Urban Studies Program, the School of Public Affairs (later renamed the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs), and the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs. Along with his inspired teaching, generous

advising of graduate students, and creative scholarly output, Lukermann pursued lifelong interests in what he termed the “proto-geography” of Classical Greece, the development of modern geographic thought and practice within the history of science, the historical geography of North America, and cultural pluralism.

Fred E. Lukermann (Necrology). 2009. AAG Newsletter 44(10): 17.

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