In May 1948, the President of the
Naval War College Admiral
Raymond Spruance recommended a plan to establish a civilian professorship of
maritime history at the
Naval War College. Approved by
Secretary of the NavyJohn L. Sullivan (Navy) on 29 December 1948, the post was not filled “for lack of funds” until 1951, when
Thomas C. Mendenhall of
Yale University was appointed to the position. In 1953,
Secretary of the NavyRobert Bernard Anderson named the chair in honor of Fleet Admiral
Ernest J. King, recognizing King’s great personal interest in maritime history. The Ernest J. King chair was named and first filled during the tenure of Professor
Clarence H. Haring. At that point, there was only one other named academic chair in the United States for the field of
maritime history, that held by the
Gardiner Professor of Oceanic History and Affairs established at
Harvard University in 1948. The Naval War College’s first permanent long-term civilian faculty member came in 1966 and its larger civilian faculty began in 1972. Between 1951 and 1973, the King Chair was regularly held as a one-year visiting appointment. It became a permanent faculty appointment in 1974. The position reverted to a visiting professorship in October 2016.[1]
John B. Hattendorf, B. Mitchell Simpson III, and John R. Wadleigh, Sailors and Scholars: The Centennial History of the U.S. Naval War College. (Newport; Naval War College Press, 1984), p. 205.
Newport, Rhode Island, Naval War College, Archives, Record Group 3, Box 141, Folder 2, "FADM Ernest J. King Professor."