Meyer, Alfred G.

Alfred George Meyer was born on February 5, 1920, in Bielefeld, Germany, the second of three sons born to parents Gustav and Therese (Melchior) Meyer. After a thwarted attempt by his parents to leave Nazi Germany in 1937, Meyer in 1939 escaped from Bielefeld to the United States, days before the start of World War II. Earlier that year his younger brother Hajo had gained passage to the Netherlands with a transport of Jewish children, and his older brother Rolf had gone to Manchester, England as an indentured laborer. Alfred was sent to live with friends of the family in Santa Ana, California, where he worked as a stenographer until joining the United States Army in 1941. Meyer's parents remained in Bielefeld, and were ultimately killed at Auschwitz. Meyer served with the United States Army from 1941 to 1945, fighting overseas in Germany with the 29th Infantry Division and eventually serving in the intelligence division as a prisoner-of-war interrogation officer, for which he received a Bronze Star Medal. In 1944 Meyer was sent by the Army to Harvard University to complete a study of Russian; after the war he returned to Harvard, receiving an AM in Slavic Languages and Literature in 1946 and a Ph.D. in Political Science in 1950.

Meyer began what was to become a long and distinguished career in teaching and scholarship as a teaching fellow in Government at Harvard, 1949-1950. He subsequently served as a research fellow at Harvard's Russian Research Center, 1950-1953, where he was assistant to the director, 1951-1952, and assistant director, 1952-1953. He then joined the faculty of the University of Washington as an acting assistant professor, 1953-1955, and subsequently became director of the research program on the history of the Communist party at Columbia University, 1955-1957. From there Meyer went to Michigan State University, where he joined the Political Science department as an associate professor, 1957-1960, and professor, 1960-1966. In 1966 he came to the University of Michigan, where as a professor of political science he taught courses in political theory, European intellectual history, communist ideology, and Soviet affairs. He was director of the University's Center for Russian and Eastern European Studies, 1969-1972, and associate director from 1983 until his retirement in 1990.

Meyer published extensively throughout his career, and became an international authority on the subjects of communist ideology, the Soviet political system, and the linkages between feminism and socialism. His books include The Incompatible Allies: A Memoir-History of German-Soviet Relations with Gustav Hilger (1953), Marxism: The Unity of Theory and Practice (1954, 1970) (translated into Spanish and Korean), Leninism (1957, 1986) (translated into French and Korean), Communism (1960, 1963, 1985), The Soviet Political System (1965), and The Feminism and Socialism of Lily Braun (1986). Meyer was editor of Women, State and Party in Eastern Europe with Sharon Wolchik (1986) and editor and translator of Lily Braun, Selected Writings on Feminism and Socialism (1987). Meyer published innumerable articles and reviews in American and European journals such as Current History, Osteuropa, World Politics, Le Monde Diplomatique, Centennial Review, Slavic Review, Soviet Union, and Russian Review, while contributing also to many encyclopedia and volumes of collected essays.

The great regard in which Meyer was held as a scholar and as a teacher is evidenced by the many honors and awards he received thought the years. At Harvard he received a Thayer Fellowship, 1946-1947, and a Fellowship in Slavic Studies from the Hoover Institution, 1947-1948. He received a Ford Foundation Area Studies Fellowship in 1954, a USSR travel grant in 1958, and was a Guggenheim fellow, 1963-1964. At Michigan State University he received the Distinguished Faculty Award in 1963, and at the University of Michigan he was awarded the Amoco Good Teaching Award in 1977 and the Sinclair Award for Freshman-Sophomore Counseling in 1979. Considering his role as teacher to be foremost in importance, Meyer was extremely popular with his students, and in 1986 was listed as "Best Professor" at the University of Michigan in Lisa Birnbach's College Book. Meyer's national distinction was recognized by his appointment to the Board of Trustees of the National Council for Soviet & East European Studies, membership on the Board of Editors of Studies in Comparative Communism and Comparative Studies in Society and History, and his appointment to the Board of Directors of the Association of Women in Slavic Studies. In 1991 Meyer was awarded the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit from the Federal Republic of Germany.

Meyer died of heart failure on April 22, 1998, at age 78. He is survived by his brother Hajo, living in the Netherlands, his wife Eva, of Ann Arbor, and his two children, Stefan, of Ann Arbor, and Vera, of Malden, Massachusetts.

From the guide to the Alfred G. Meyer Papers, ca. 1860-1998, 1930s-1970s, (Bentley Historical Library University of Michigan)