15 September
Born on September 15, 1945 in Chicago, Jonathan Walton attended the University of Illinois-Chicago before going on to complete masters and doctoral degrees at Princeton University. His dissertation, entitled “Blacks in Buxton and Chatham, Ontario, 1830-1890: Did the 49th Parallel Make a Difference?,” explored two Black communities in the Canadian province of Ontario, Buxton and Chatham, in an effort to determine whether Black residents experienced the improved conditions and freedom that they had hoped for in immigrating to Canada from the United States. Political conditions in Canada, he found, were more favorable prior to the American Civil War. After the war, however, racial prejudice and job competition from European immigrants circumscribed opportunities for Blacks in similar ways.
Walton joined the UI faulty in 1977 with a joint appointment in History and Afro-American Studies. He researched, wrote, and taught about African American history with an emphasis on comparing Black Communities in the United States and Canada. He taught courses on African American history, colonial African history, the civil rights movement, Black leadership in the twentieth century, slavery in the Americas, and race relations in the United States. Walton researched, wrote, and taught about African American history with an emphasis on comparing Black Communities in the United States and Canada. He taught courses on African American history, colonial African history, the civil rights movement, Black leadership in the twentieth century, slavery in the Americas, and race relations in the United States.
Being one of only a few faculty members of color at the university and the only one to teach African American history posed its challenges for Dr. Walton. Writing to Department Chair Ellis Hawley to request an extension for his tenure review, he noted that because the African American World Studies Program was so small, faculty members were stretched very thin in completing things like committee and administrative work. Also, as one of small number of African American faculty, Walton was often asked to take on committee work, with those requests often “couched in terms of a need for greater diversity on the committee.” Furthermore, he was only faculty member teaching courses in African American history and often need to work with graduate students pursuing topics related to African American history through independent studies in order to help prepare them for their comprehensive exams. All these factors, he explained, slowed the pace of his own research, making it difficult to meet the requirement of obtaining a contract to publish a manuscript in order to be considered for tenure. Dr. Melba Joyce Boyd, a former member of the UI’s African American Studies program, put the situation more bluntly when, in an article for The Black Scholar, she writes, “Because of limited resources accorded to the program, Walton was often thrust into leadership roles that detracted from his own scholarship, and the book manuscript he needed to publish for tenure in the History Department” (“The Legacy of Darwin T. Turner and the Struggle for African-American Studies,” The Black Scholar 41, no. 4 (2011): 15).
Dr. Walton passed away in Chicago at the age of forty-three in 1988. He had planned to take a two-year leave from the UI that fall to teach at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, and was also setting up a major study on the demobilization of formerly enslaved people who were recruited into the Union army. The deep impact that Dr. Walton had on the university community was clear through the memories that his students and colleagues shared after his passing. Clenora Hudson, who completed her PhD at the university with Walton as her advisor, wrote that, “The truth is that if it wouldn’t have been for my mentor, the chair of my dissertation committee, my warrior, my friend, and my fountain of inspiration, Dr. Jonathan Walton, my dissertation would yet to be realized,” and that, “It was not enough that he believed in me but that that he also made me believe in myself again.”
History professor Malcolm Rohrbough, in a memorial speech, noted how Walton was “adept in bringing together people from diverse parts of the university, all in pursuit of his vision of the university community of the whole.” For UI faculty member Ozzie Díaz-Duque, as one of the few openly gay professionals at the university, Dr. Walton was “an inspiring and courageous role model” for those struggling with their sexual identities. At the same time that Walton noted that “even in a citadel of liberalism,” like the university town he was in while he was on leave, “homophobia is a respectable prejudice,” Díaz-Duque explained that he spoke of homophobic people in Iowa City with “typical openmindness and compassion.” Walton noted that some of them were “making genuine efforts to come to grips with themselves, their religious background, their coming out process, their fear of disease, their concern for normalcy, and their fears of exposure to friends, family, and colleagues.”
Walton’s impact extended beyond the university to the Iowa City community. His neighbor, Trace Custer, explained that, “he taught me tolerance, laughter, and what it was like as the only white kid at a black reading group…He introduced me to the knowledge that no matter where you come from, your destiny is your own…His spirit, his compassion, his love, his tolerance live on.” Walton was involved in organizations such as the Iowa NAACP, the Helen Lemme Reading Group, the Iowa City Free Medical Clinic, and the Iowa City-Cedar Rapids Reading Club. Dr. Walton’s legacy lives on through several funds and awards named in his honor, including funds at the Iowa City Free Medical Clinic and the UI Foundation, as well as research funds in History and American Studies for students from underrepresented groups.
“UI’s Walton Dies While in Chicago,” Daily Iowan (August 2, 1988)
Walton, Memorial Service, Iowa City
Walton, Memorial Service, Chicago
Walton, Malcolm Rohrbough Remarks, Celebration of Life, August 1988
Walton, Memorial Resolution, CLAS Faculty Assembly, April 1989
Walton, In Memoriam, by Non-History Colleagues
Remembering Jonathan Walton, Trace Custer and Tony Haughton
Walton, Request to Dept for Extension, January 24, 1988
Walton, From African to Afro-American: Blacks in the United States 1600-1865
Jason Sole, “Honoring Legacy of Late University of Iowa Professor Has Never Been More Needed,” Iowa Press-Citizen (March 11, 2022)
Documents from UI Department of History, Jonathan Walton File.