Historian Larry Gara fired a half-century ago for left-wing political views finally gets apology

Related Link College apologizes to professor labeled a communist and fired in 1962 (Guardian)

In the thick of the Cold War, the small Pennsylvania college where Larry Gara was an outspoken history professor called him a bad teacher, labeled him a Communist and unceremoniously showed him the door.

Now, 53 years later, the school says it's sorry.

Gara's firing from Grove City College in 1962 briefly stirred up a national debate over institutional autonomy vs. academic freedom. He moved on with his life, eventually settling into a teaching job at Wilmington College in Ohio. He figured the Grove City chapter was behind him for good.

So no one was more surprised than the now 93-year-old Gara when someone showed up at his front door recently to apologize.

No one directly involved with his firing is alive today, but the August visit from Richard Jewell, a former president of the Presbyterian college, was a curious and satisfying development for Gara, who had successfully meshed his social-justice activism with a long, distinguished teaching career at Wilmington in southwestern Ohio. ...