By Ella Prieto, Editor-in-Chief
After 38 years of teaching at Gettysburg College (47 years overall), Professor of History and College Marshal Michael Birkner ’72 taught his final class, History 300: Historical Methods, last week. He officially retires in May, using a sabbatical for the remainder of the academic year.
Professor Birkner with his final class. (Photo Courtesy of Gettysburg College History Department)
Birkner has a long history with Gettysburg College, entering as a student in 1968, studying history and serving as The Gettysburgian’s Editor-in-Chief. After graduating in 1972, he earned his master’s degree and doctorate from the University of Virginia in American history. Birkner returned to the College as a professor in 1989 and has since taught 65 300-level history classes, impacting thousands of students.
Birkner (Bottom Row, Second from the left) with the staff of The Gettysburgian in 1972. (Photo Courtesy of Spectrum Yearbook)
Beyond teaching, he was the editorial page editor and chief editorial writer for New Hampshire’s Concord Monitor in the 1980s when he took a break from his academic career. Birker has also published many books, including “The Governors of New Jersey: Biographical Essays” (2013), a social history of his hometown (Bergenfield New Jersey), which was a CHOICE outstanding academic book in 1994, and three edited volumes on President James Buchanan. He also published a biography of Eisenhower for middle-school students, an illustrated history of the Eisenhowers, a volume of firsthand accounts titled “Encounters With Eisenhower” (2015) and numerous scholarly and popular articles on aspects of the Eisenhower presidency.
Recognition of Birkner’s expert knowledge on President Dwight D. Eisenhower allowed him to lead a Gilder-Lehrman summer seminar at American University focused on Eisenhower’s presidential leadership in 2018. From 1998 to 2016, he also collaborated with the Eisenhower National Historic Site supervisory historian in running a summer institute for secondary school teachers focused on Eisenhower’s presidency. He consulted for the e-Eisenhower project of the Eisenhower Memorial Commission as well.
Professor Birkner teaching. (Photo Melinda M. Hutton/Gettysburg College Special Collections)
Throughout his career, he has served in several distinguished roles and committees. From 2001 to 2016, he served as Benjamin Franklin Professor of Liberal Arts. During that time, he was also the President of the Pennsylvania Historical Association from 2014 to 2016. He worked on the Pulitzer Prize jury for History twice, the second time in 2006 as jury chair.
Remarking on his time at the College, Birkner stated that teaching here has been a privilege. Upon entering as a student, he has “breathed liberal arts ever since.” He noted that during a time when humanities are struggling nationwide, he feels ever stronger about the importance of his colleagues in the history department.
“We cannot just assume most Americans think that evidence-based history matters,” explained Birkner. “Our teaching and scholarship are designed to entice students and a broader public to engage with the human story in the best ways.”
Regarding his students and peers, he shared, “I have had the great satisfaction of watching students grow intellectually here at Gettysburg and go on to make contributions to the wider world beyond Gettysburg along many different tracks. I’ve had the best faculty colleagues anyone could want, the best possible support from the library staff, and professional opportunities I could not have imagined when I started my adventure with history. In sum, I’ve been a lucky man, and Gettysburg College has been integral to my good fortune.”
Birkner in the Spectrum Yearbook from 1971. (Photo Courtesy of the Spectrum Yearbook)
Following Birkner’s retirement, he will work to write a new history of Gettysburg College in connection with the 200th anniversary of its founding, occurring in 2032. Thus, he will still have an office in Weidensall Hall, assuring that he is “not going anywhere!” Alongside that project, he will continue to write books, having just completed drafting a book on Dwight Eisenhower’s election to the presidency in 1952. He hopes to write a further book on Eisenhower’s years based here in Gettysburg, from 1961 to 1967, which he notes “were remarkably busy and fruitful years for the nation’s 34th president.”
Community Reflections
The Gettysburgian reached out to several of Birkner’s students, advisees, and colleagues, and asked what impact he had on them.
Olivia Taylor ’25 detailed how Birkner was key in her decision to come to Gettysburg.
“His willingness to answer my emails as a high school junior who had never set foot on campus told me everything I needed to know about the faculty at Gettysburg,” said Taylor. “Three years later, as a student in his Historical Methods class (and later his Modern Australia class), it became apparent to me that he was the embodiment of the amazing place and amazing people he spoke of.”
She also shared that Birkner’s Historical Methods class is one of her favorite classes she took at Gettysburg. Though it was challenging, it shaped her as a history student and was immensely rewarding.
“He was not only an amazing professor, but an amazing advisor and mentor as well,” Taylor elaborated. “He gave me the confidence both inside and outside of the classroom to tackle anything that came my way, from one of his notorious three-hour exams, to figuring out what life would look like after Gettysburg College. He valued his students not just as students of history, but as people. I wish him all the best in his retirement!”
Professor of History and College Marshal Michael Birkner ’72 addressing the Class of 2029. (Photo William Oehler/The Gettysburgian)
Rachel Main ’22 echoed Taylor, discussing how Birkner has always advocated for her. From encouraging her as she began teaching high school history to endorsing her application to a master’s program in history through Arizona State University, Birkner has been steadfast in his support.
“[He] Opened a new realm of personal academic study and topics that have spurred countless lessons for my own students,” stated Main. “History methods opened up a new appreciation for oral history that has been a methodological focus for my own research and for my students. I’m forever grateful and inspired by Professor Birkner, and his legacy is quintessential to the generations of Gettysburgians that he has been able to instruct.”
Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies Ian Isherwood ’00 first knew Birkner as a student, taking his Historical Methods class and later writing his senior capstone in Birkner’s Eisenhower Seminar.
“Both personally and professionally he has guided me with every stage of my career – from being a student research assistant in the history department to becoming a tenured professor,” explained Isherwood. “With everything I have written as a professional historian, I have had his voice in the back of my mind telling me to be fair to my sources, triangulate my evidence, and beyond anything else, write with clarity and in a style that will engage the reader.”
Isherwood detailed how Birkner mentored generations of Gettysburgians through his high standards and expectations of an individual’s best work. Furthermore, he lives his professorship and teaches history by example, working in the archives almost daily.
“He has a remarkable record of bringing out the best in students beyond what they believed possible,” added Isherwood. “And that’s the key part – he recognizes that teaching is about forming human connections – this is why so many of us view him as a foundational part of our intellectual development. He has taken the qualities of rigor, fairness, and insatiable curiosity for the past and turned them into a pedagogical art form in the classroom.”
Birkner has also given so much to the College, chairing the History Department for a decade and serving on “too many committees to count.”
“[He] has always answered the college’s call,” Isherwood concluded. “A college is a community, and our community can thank its lucky stars that Michael Birkner arrived here as a student in 1968, returned as a permanent faculty member in 1989, and decided to make his life making our college community better. He has loved, defended, and honored our college – and then some.”
Professor Birkner (2nd Row, Second from the Left) in a History Department Yearbook Photo from 1991. (Photo Courtesy of the Spectrum Yearbook)
College Archivist Amy Lucadamo ’00 was also a student of Birkner’s. She described her time as his student with a favorite quote of his: “’If God himself were in this class, I’d find something to mark him down on.”
“Dr. Birkner spoke those words to my senior seminar class on October 26, 1999. I kept a copy of that quote taped to the back of my door in Ice House while I researched and wrote my thesis – a reminder that expectations were high,” said Lucadamo. “Classes with Dr. Birkner were a rite of passage for Gettysburg History majors. He taught us to do history and made sure we knew how to do it thoroughly and conscientiously. We triangulated, peeled back the onion, determined a preponderance of evidence and turned every page. We are better for it.”
Colleagues of Birkner’s commented on his impact on the History Department and the College as a whole.
Fellow History Professor Timothy Shannon described Birkner as the “cornerstone of the History Department for nearly forty years.” He explained that as the chair in the 1990s, Birkner shaped the future of the History faculty and curriculum, recruiting active teacher-scholars who reinvigorated the History major.
“Throughout his career, he has been a tireless promoter of our students, setting high expectations for them while they are here and then advising and encouraging them in their lives and careers long after they have graduated,” added Shannon. “While faculty members generally like to think of themselves as the core of the institution, the fact is that no single one of us is indispensable. But it is hard for me to think of this place without Michael because he has been such a good friend and mentor for all of these years. The College and the History Department will have a big hole to fill when he retires.”
President of Gettysburg College, Robert Iuliano, who asked Birker to write the new history of the College, commented that “It is altogether fitting that a person who has so ably studied and taught history is now making history, as he retires after more than three decades on the faculty—three decades of remarkable service, three decades in which he profoundly shaped the lives of countless students.”
President Iuliano, Professor Birkner and a student celebrating the commencement for the 2025 class of Master’s students at the Majestic Theater. (Photo Courtesy of Gettysburg College)
Iuliano stated that he turned to Birkner “more times than I can count” for advice, conversation, and friendship, adding that he takes great comfort knowing Birkner will remain on campus as he updates the history of the College. He ended with a quote that summarizes the entire campus’s sentiment to Professor Birkner: “Bravo and congratulations to a wonderful colleague and stellar professor!”
