Reference Point

Speaking of history K napp, '68, continues connection with CMU University of California, Berkeley, Professor Emeritus Robert Knapp felt at home when he pulled a chair up to the Clarke Historical Library table and began poring through past Clare County homestead maps. This is a common activity for Knapp each time he returns to Michigan, visits his alma mater and utilizes its resources to research his family's or the region's history, depending on what his project is at the time. "You can't take history away from a historian," says Knapp, a 1968 CMU graduate who was valedictorian of the mid-year graduating class. "I wanted to do research on the logging history of the Clare area, but when I started poking around I became more and more interested in the town itself. I'm currently working on a book about the 1938 murder of Isaiah Leebove, who was linked to the Purple Gang and killed in the bar at the Doherty Hotel. " Knapp had returned to campus earlier this year to speak at the Friends of the Libraries Annual Luncheon and came back in early November to receive CMU's Distinguished Alumni Award. Robert Knapp He says he never would have dreamed that the university where he grew up and earned his degree would recognize him in such a way. In addition to graduating from CMU, Knapp also attended the lab schools here because his dad, Austin, was a political science professor, and his mom, Gail, was a history department secretary. "It was such a surprise and is such an honor, " Knapp says. "I know my father and grandmother, both CMU grads, would be proud. And I have never lost my aff ection for Central, Mount Pleasant and Clare. " At the Friends of the Libraries luncheon, Knapp spoke on "Ordinary People of Ancient Rome: The Empire's 99%." His presentation was based on his most recent book, "Invisible Romans. " Knapp says that he taught a course on Roman civilization at the University of California, Berkeley, and over time he became dissatisfi ed with the textbooks' focus on the elite such as Julius Caesar and Augustus. They were the one percent, but there was little about the other 99 percent, according to Knapp. "This 99 percent were the ordinary people, and ordinary people drive any culture, says. " he In developing the book, Knapp says he discovered there are several sources that provided glimpses into the lives of invisible Romans, including New Testament Gospels and Epistles, books of ancient dream interpretations, astrological texts, and epigraphy on the gravestones. "I was able to knit the strands together enough to tell their stories, " Knapp says. "I didn't want it to be a dry, scholarly book, I wanted one that was carefully grounded in the facts, but entertaining as well as informative. " "Invisible Romans" was published by Harvard University Press and has been featured in publications including The New Yorker magazine and the Washington Post. • 3

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