professor, historian, author, b. Portage. He was the son of Andrew Jackson Turner (q.v.). He attended high school in Portage, graduated from the Univ. of Wisconsin (A.B., 1884; A.M., 1888), and johns Hopkins Univ. (Ph.D., 1890). He was assistant professor of history at the Univ. of Wisconsin (1889-1891), professor of history (1891-1892), and professor of American history (1892-1910). During his tenure at the Univ. of Wisconsin, Turner built up a strong department of effective scholars and trained a number of students who later became leaders in the historical profession. Called to Harvard in 1910, he was professor of history there until his retirement in 1924, when he returned to Madison, and several years later moved to Pasadena, Calif. He was a research associate at the Huntington Library at the time of his death. As an historian, Turner did pioneer work in the history of the West, emphasizing the influence of the frontier and of sectionalism in American history. His emphasis on the role of the frontier, which came to be known as the "Turner thesis," was first presented in "Significance of the Frontier in American History," a paper read before the American Historical Association in 1893. He was the author of several collections of historical essays, among them The Frontier in American History (1920), and The Significance of Sectionalism in American History, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1932. He was president of the American Historical Association (1909-1910). A magnetic teacher and a researcher of uncommon penetration and insight, Turner's teachings and interpretations of American history have had a profound impact on American historians for over a generation. Dict. Amer. Biog.; Who's Who in Amer., 16 (1939); Wis. Mag. Hist., 15, 25; Madison Wis. State Journal, Mar. 15, 1932; Pasadena (Calif.) Star-News, Mar. 19, 1932.

The Wisconsin Historical Society has manuscripts related to this topic. See the catalog description of the Frederick Jackson Turner Papers for details. See also the Frederick Jackson Turner Lecture Notes.  See also the Frederick Jackson Turner Letters.  See also the Andrew J. and Frederick Jackson Turner Papers.

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[Source: Dictionary of Wisconsin biography]