Richard J. M. Blackett

Professor Helps Lead UH History Program of the Future

It seems almost weekly we hear about professional sports teams signing that big free agent who will lead them to a championship. These mega-buck signings have become part of the fabric of sports today. Well, one might say that former soccer star and UH professor Richard J. Blackett had completed a similar kind of deal in 1996. That’s when the athlete-turned-foremost-expert in his field was named the University of Houston’s Moores Distinguished Chair of History and African American Studies, underscoring the importance of his “all-star” research and teaching as well as the “mega” support garnered from UH.

“One doesn’t get offered an endowed chair often,” Blackett said. “This was a good department and I knew it would only get better.”

Born in Trinidad and educated in England, Blackett was a professor of history at Indiana University but quickly accepted the position here at UH.

“It was a bit selfish. Indiana was nice but being from Trinidad, I liked the fact that Houston had a near sub-tropical climate,” Blackett remarked with a grin.

Blackett, a charismatic and clever man with a tremendous sense of humor, is being featured in UH’s unique image campaign that is being launched this February. He sits on more than a dozen committees and editorial boards including the Association of Caribbean Historians, Civil War History, the Journal of Negro History, and is former editor of the Indiana Magazine of History. Author of numerous articles and four books, Blackett’s newest work will be available in the fall of 2000 and is titled Divided Hearts: Britain and the American Civil War. In it he delves into the complex history of British popular reactions to the Civil War.

Despite his vast accomplishments and tremendous accolades, Blackett says he had little idea where his life would lead or will lead from here for that matter.

“My grandfather was a lawyer so I suppose part of the reason was to defy my family’s desire for me to be a lawyer. I knew I liked stories; I liked telling stories. But people have asked me and I really don’t know what it was,” Brackett explained. “I don’t plan my life out. I don’t have any visions that way. I let things come as the may.”

Since arriving in Houston Brackett has immersed himself in the citys culture. The public schools and quiet neighborhoods attracted him to Pearland. A devout family man, he spends as much time as he can with his wife and two sons.

“I spend a great deal of time either on bleachers watching or coaching my sons’ soccer teams,” said Blackett. He, a college soccer player while working on his bachelor’s degree in England, enjoys his newfound access to soccer via the Spanish media outlets in Houston.

“I get more than enough soccer now that I live in Houston, thanks to the Spanish stations,” said Blackett. “If there was any more soccer, I wouldn’t get my work done.”