John Leland Champe

For other people named John Champe, see John Champe.

John Leland Champe (1895–1978) was an academic and archaeologist especially influential in the area of Great Plains archaeology.[1]

Champe was born in 1895 in Elwood, Nebraska.[2] In 1921, he earned a BA from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in mathematics. In 1924, he married Flavia Waters.[3] Before moving to New York to enter the Ph.D. program in anthropology at Columbia University in 1938, Champe had been vice president and a claims adjustor at a Nebraska insurance company.[2][3] While at Columbia, he studied under William Duncan Strong.[2]

Champe then worked as a professional archaeologist for the Works Progress Administration until 1940 when he returned to the University of Nebraska–Lincoln as an instructor in mathematics.[2][4] The next year he helped establish the Laboratory of Anthropology at the university.[2]

He earned his Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1946 and became assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in 1947.[5] From 1953–1961, he was Chairman of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.[3]

References

1. O'Shea, John M; Ludwickson, John (1992). Archaeology and ethnohistory of the Omaha Indians: the big village site. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press. p. xvii. ISBN 978-0-8032-3556-4. Retrieved 2010-05-09.
2. Sehnert, Walt (April 22, 2013). "NU's Dr. John Leland Champe". McCook Daily Gazette. Retrieved 2014-03-22.
3. W. Raymond Wood (June 1979). "John Leland Champe 1895-1978". American Anthropologist. 81 (2). American Anthropological Association: 338–342. doi:10.1525/aa.1979.81.2.02a00100. Archived from the original on 2013-01-06. Retrieved 2010-05-09.
4. Lambert, Marjorie (1961). "John Leland Champe: A Founder of the Plains Conference". Plains Anthropologist. 6. Plains Anthropological Society: 73. Retrieved 2010-09-20.
5. "Champe, John L." Archives & Special Collections. University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries. Retrieved 2014-03-22.