Joseph J. Ellis

Joseph J. Ellis received his BA from the College of William and Mary and his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1969. He taught at the United States Military Academy before accepting a position in the History department at Mount Holyoke College. He was eventually appointed to the Ford Foundation Chair in History, and temporarily served as Acting President of the college. In 2001 he was put on leave after he falsely claimed to his students that he had served in the Vietnam War. Ellis took full responsibility for this mistake and apologized; Mount Holyoke reappointed him to the chair in 2005. Ellis’ research focuses on the Founding Fathers, the era of the American Revolution, and the Federalist years. He has written biographies of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington, as well as many other books covering the Revolutionary period and its aftermath. He lives in Western Massachusetts with his wife, Ellen Wilkins Ellis, with whom he has three children.