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X-Posted from H-NET List for African History and Culture <H-AFRICA@H-NET.MSU.EDU> From: Jeremy Rich <jrich@MTSU.EDU> ----------- Date: Friday, 7 September 2007 From: Thomas Spear <tspear@wisc.edu> William Allen Brown, Ph.D., age 73, passed away at home in Madison on Tuesday, August 28, 2007. Dr. Brown was born January 29, 1934 in New York City, where he attended DeWitt Clinton High School prior to joining the Air Force. On leaving the Air Force, he enrolled in Kentucky State University, where he majored in History and Government and French Language and Literature, graduating with highest distinction as valedictorian in 1959. He was then awarded a Fulbright grant to attend the Université de Sorbonne in Paris, where he again led his class. Upon completing his studies in France, he entered the University of Wisconsin-Madison to study African history and Islamic studies. At Wisconsin, he was awarded a number of fellowships, including: a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, National Defense Foreign Language Fellowship in Arabic, and a Foreign Area Fellowship for Africa. He conducted research in Mali from 1965-66 for his doctoral dissertation, "The Caliphate of Hamdullahi, ca. 1818-1864: A Study in African History and Tradition," which he submitted to Wisconsin in 1969 and remains the authoritative study of the area. Prof. Brown started his teaching career at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria and subsequently held positions at Yale University, Harvard University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, from which he retired as Emeritus Professor in 2006. He received research grants from the Ford Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the American Philosophical Society, and he published "Toward a Chronology for the Caliphate of Hamdullah," Cahiers D'etudes Africanines; "A New Bio-bibliographical Aid: 'The Izalat Al-Rayb' of Muhammad Boul Araf" and "Nasiwal Asudan': A Guide to Legal History in Mali," both in the Research Bulletin Center of Arabic Documentation, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria; and Great Rulers of the African Past. He also organized the first conference on Black Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1967 that resulted in the publication of S. Henderson and M. Cook (eds.), The Militant Black Writer in the U.S. and Africa. He is survived by his sisters, Pat Lessner and Marcia Brown together with nephews and nieces, April White, Myles Brown, Mark Brown, and Robyn Brown. His parents and another sister, Mildrid Brown, predeceased him. A memorial service will be held Saturday, September 8th, at 11:00 am at the Cress Funeral Home, 3325 East Washington Avenue in Madison.
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