In Memoriam, Harold Herman

Harold Jerome Herman, who taught in the English Department for more than three decades, died on December 12, 2016, at the Washington Hospital Center, Washington, DC, after a brief illness. He was 87 years old.

The fourth child of Myron Solomon Herman and Susan Fritchey Herman, he was born on April 29, 1929, in Smithfield Township, Pennsylvania. He graduated with honors from Huntingdon High School in 1947 and attended the University of Maryland, where he received his BA and MA degrees and was inducted into Phi Kappa Phi. He received his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in 1957 and taught there until he joined the faculty at the University of Maryland where he designed and taught the course in the Arthurian Legend for many years. Much of his scholarship was in Medieval Literature. He established the Chi Tau Chapter of the Signa Tau Delta English Honor Society at the University of Maryland and introduced an internship program which provided supervised work experience for English majors in organizations such as law firms, state and federal government departments, and newspapers. In addition to his academic work, he and  Harold F. Mays Jr. operated Two Harolds Antiques in Old Town, Alexandria, Virginia, for 12 years. After retiring as Professor Emeritus from the University of Maryland in 1994, he compiled The Fritchey Family in America, 1856-2010, a two-volume genealogy which is in the Huntingdon County Historical Society. He was an avid reader, gardener, stamp collector, and book collector.

He is survived by his sister, Clara Bass, of Buena Park, California, and many nephews, nieces, and cousins, as well as his partner of 50 years, Harold F. Mays Jr.