Robert A. Calvert

Who was Robert A. Calvert?

Robert Arnold Calvert, Jr., known as Bob Calvert, was a historian and professor at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas, best known for his standard textbook, The History of Texas, co-authored with Arnoldo De Leon and Gregg Cantrell.

Calvert was born in Stephenville, the seat of Erath County, located southeast of Abilene, Texas. He attended Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, and the University of North Texas at Denton prior to entering the United States Army in 1954. He procured both his Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts in history from North Texas. He taught history in the Denton public schools and at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, Louisiana. He taught at the University of North Texas, his alma mater, from 1967–1973, when he resigned to pursue his Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin, from which he graduated in 1975. He then joined the TAMU faculty, of which he had also been a member from 1965-1966. There he specialized in the history of Texas and the American South since 1877, with emphasis on the civil rights movement. He also wrote textbooks on ethnic and labor history, 20th century Texas, and the Progressive movement in the South.