Jeannette Hopkins

Jeannette Hopkins
Born1923 (1923)
Died2011 (aged 87–88)
EducationVassar, BA, English, 1944
Columbia School of Journalism, MS, 1945
Known forBook editing
Notable workKenneth Clark, Jacques Barzun, Frank Mankiewicz, Edwin Newman, Annie Dillard

Jeannette Hopkins (1923–2011) was notable for a remarkable career in letters when few women worked in the field. In the mid-1940s, she was a reporter for the New Haven Register, the Providence Journal-Bulletin and the Oklahoma City Times. In 1952, she served as senior editor at Beacon Press, Harcourt Brace & World, and Harper & Row.[1] In 1973, she worked as a consulting editor for Harper & Row, McGraw-Hill, MacMillan, Random House, and Yale.[1] In 1980, she was named director and editor-in-chief at Wesleyan University Press.[1][2][3]

Praised for her "wide-ranging intellectual curiosity that informed her taste in books combined with a sophisticated sense of language and book structure ... [and] her extraordinary intellectual toughness,"[2] Hopkins developed a "stable" of historians, journalists, political scientists, theologians, and scholars, including James MacGregor Burns, Jacques Barzun and Eugene Genovese, Frank Mankiewicz, Edwin Newman, Annie Dillard, and C.S. Lewis.[4] In a letter to the editor of the New York Times Magazine, she noted that "Authors have an afterlife that may be lasting, the life of their books."[5]

Guided by an interest in "public affairs, specifically civil liberties and race relations" and described by PEN America as a "social justice advocate,"[3] Hopkins was an elected at-large member of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) National Board, as well as a member of their National Advisory Council. In 1970, Hopkins co-authored A Relevant War Against Poverty with Kenneth B. Clark.[6] Hopkins also authored articles and books on Unitarianism, civil rights, and New Hampshire history.[7] Despite her focus on nonfiction, however, she was credited for providing some editing to BOA Editions Ltd., a not-for-profit literary publisher known for their poetry, poetry-in-translation, and short fiction.[8]

Authors

A partial list of Hopkins's authors include:

Bibliography

  • Clarke, Kenneth B., and Hopkins, Jeannette. A Relevant War Against Poverty. Harper & Row, 1970. ASIN: B00B2CXVEC
  • Hopkins, Jeannette. Fourteen Journeys to Unitarianism. Beacon Press, 1959. ASIN: B00188159I
  • Hopkins, Jeannette, "Racial justice and the press: Mutual suspicion or 'the saving remnant'?" Metropolitan Applied Research Center, 1968. ASIN: B0006CHDW0
  • Hopkins, Jeannette. Legacy: A history of the South Church endowment. Unitarian-Universalist Church of Portsmouth, N.H., 1995. ISBN: BX9861.P67 H67.
  • Butler, Jeffrey. Cradock: How Segregation and Apartheid came to a South African Town. Richard Elphick and Jeannette Hopkins, eds. University of Virginia Press, 2017.[9] ISBN: Sc E 18-129
  • The Warner House. Joyce Geary Volk and Jeannette Hopkins, eds. The Warner House Association, 2006. ISBN: JQG 07-622

Archive

Memberships

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c "Guide to the Jeannette Hopkins Papers, 1922-2011 | Vassar College Digital Library". digitallibrary.vassar.edu. Archived from the original on 2025-12-11. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  2. ^ a b selliott (2011-08-12). "Jeannette Hopkins, press director (1980-89), dies |". Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  3. ^ a b kanopi_admin (2011-09-12). "PEN Remembers Book Editor and PEN Member Jeannette Hopkins". PEN America. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  4. ^ McMahon, Charles. "Renowned book editor Jeannette Hopkins dies at 88". Portsmouth Herald. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  5. ^ "Letters: My Father's Broken Heart". The New York Times. 2010-07-16. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  6. ^ "English - After Vassar - Jeannette Hopkins '44 | Vassar College". www.vassar.edu. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  7. ^ Social Work, Volume 15, Issue 4, October 1970, Pages 115–116, https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/15.4.115
  8. ^ The University of Rochester’s BOA Editions Limited Collection, Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation Department (Apr 5, 2016). "BOA Editions Limited PapersD.37". BOA Editions Limited PapersD.378. Rush Rhees Library, Second Floor, Room 225, Rochester, NY 14627-0055: BOA Editions Limited. Retrieved Feb 26 2026. {{cite web}}: Check |archive-url= value (help); Check date values in: |access-date= (help)CS1 maint: location (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  9. ^ "Elphick Edits Late Professor's Book on the History of South Africa's Racial Segregation". Retrieved 2026-02-26.