Former Political Science Prof. Robert Sullivant Dies at Age 89
September 29, 2014
Robert S. Sullivant, who taught political science at DePauw University from 1959 to 1965, died Thursday, September 25, in Toledo, Ohio. He was 89 years old. (at right: Prof. Sullivant in 1964)
Born January 23, 1925, in Williams, Arizona, Sullivant started college at age 16. He was a second lieutenant in the Army Air Corps in World War II and served as a radar weather officer at Barksdale Field in Shreveport, Louisiana. He received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science from the University of California at Los Angeles and a doctorate from the University of Chicago.
Sullivant came to DePauw in 1959 as an assistant professor of political science. He took a leave to be a post-doctoral exchange student at Moscow State University in 1961, the first of his many trips to Russia. His scholarly specialities included nationalities in the Soviet Union and the structure of the Communist Party and his publications included the study, Soviet Politics and the Ukraine, 1917-1957. (at left: Sullivant with John A. Anderson, professor emeritus of mathematics at DePauw, in 1963)
At DePauw, he presented an October 1961 chapel address titled, ""Russian Politics and the New Soviet Man." In April 1963, he spoke at the University's Business and Industry Day on ""Russia, Khrushchev and Peaceful Co-existence." Audio of the latter speech is available at the DePauw Archives online.
Professor Sullivant also taught at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, where served as dean of the graduates school; the University of Chicago; Georgetown University;
and the University of South Dakota. He was also a fellow at Harvard University’s Russian Research Center.
Dr. Sullivant was appointed executive vice president at the University of Toledo in 1973 and retired from that institution in 1990 as a professor emeritus of political science .
Memorial services will be at 11 a.m. Saturday in Epworth United Methodist Church, Ottawa Hills, Ohio.
An online obituary is available here.
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