Dr. Harold Milton Rose

"As we approach the end of life and look back over life's course many things come to mind that brought both pleasure and pain during the long journey. Those recollections allow us to reflect upon our successes and failures and the general struggle it took to finally reach old age. Now that most of life is behind us rather than ahead of us we can objectively assess how well we have fared and how much better or worse things might have been. I was born in Nashville, Tennessee in 1930 at the onset of the great depression, but because of my mother's continuing ill health (mother Marie Murphy and father Lawrence Rose), I was taken to Mt Pleasant, Tennessee to be reared by my grandparents, Mr. Lias Long and Mrs. Gertrude Long. Black youngsters growing up in small southern communities were taught, very early on, proper racial etiquette. Black parents taught their children the rules of appropriate conduct to be applied in the presence of the dominant white population. Those lessons constituted an indispensable survival strategy for life along the racial divide in the South during that era." Harold M. Rose, 9/17/04 Dr. Harold Rose is lovingly survived by his wife of 60 years, Ann Louise; and one son, Gregory of Nashville, Tennessee. He leaves a beautiful granddaughter, Latisa Dixon; three cherished great-grandchildren all of Jackson, TN along with thousands of devoted students and colleagues from UWM and across the United States. As well as a large loving family and many friends. He was born January 8, 1930 and entered heaven on February 2, 2016. A world leader in the field of Urban Geography and Race, Harold rarely mentioned the four books he got published, the 16 articles he wrote, and he made presentations at 64 universities across the United States. Humble, brilliant, and a giant in the world of race he regretted that his life required him to be consumed with issues of race, but he knew that to be less involved was simply not possible. Rejected by the Army in 1947 for being underweight, Harold Rose took up migrant work only to quickly change his mind and make his way to Tennessee State where he graduated in 1950, and after exploring a dismal employment situation he finally got himself inducted into the US Army in 1951 and witnessed from the inside the desegregation of the military. Upon returning to the US he worked several dry cleaning jobs but enrolled again at Tennessee State to take some Geography courses. There he was encouraged to apply to the Master's program at Ohio State and he did just that. He finally had that G1 Bill he so deserved. He was a founding member of the DuBois Club of Beta Alpha Boule and a member of the Frontiers. Dr. Rose's UWM Geography colleagues pulled together his accomplishments as his final notes did not elaborate on what he earned, but rather hi deep feelings for his family, his journey UWM, specifically his colleagues. A quieter man who argued his points with a smile and gentle laugh, he frequently forgot to mention himself and his contributions. The UWM Geography Department writes: Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Geography and Urban Studies Harold M. Rose. Dr. Rose received his PhD in Geography from Ohio State University in 1960. After holding positions at Northwestern University, UCLA, Washington University, Florida A&M, and many other universities, Dr. Rose joined the Geography faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) in 1962. Professor Rose had a long and distinguished career at UWM. He was active not just in Geography, where he served as chair from 1990-1994, but he \\ a also a key figure in the Department of Urban Affairs (now Urban Studies), which he chaired from 1970-1973 and 1974-1977, and in the Department of Afro-American Studies (now Africologv), which he chaired from 1977-1978. While the number of students Dr. Rose worked with is difficult to enumerate, he touched the lives of countless urban scholars and practitioners. He modeled the role of public scholar and mentor long after his retirement. Dr. Rose was a ground breaking and courageous scholar whose research challenged racism at a time when very few in geography even acknowledged racism and its consequences. Professor Rose's interest in racism and the social and spatial production of the Black ghetto developed upon his arrival to Milwaukee. He came to a deeply segregated city during a time of heightened civil rights activism around housing and school segregation. He began his career exploring issues of natural resource management but shifted his focus to examine those problems that he found more immediate to his lived experience in the mid 1960's Milwaukee. Joining a small group of geographers in a debate about the relevance of the discipline, Professor Rose modeled the example of community engaged research. He was extensively involved in community service, from his early work with the Milwaukee Urban League to his seat on the Board of Directors for the community based North Milwaukee State Bank. Professor Rose retired from UWM in 1995 after thirty-one years of teaching, pioneering scholarship, and a remarkable career of mentoring and public scholarship. He served as President of the Association of American Geographers (MG) from 1976-1977 and received an MG Lifetime Achievement Honor in 1996. He was the first Black president of the MG and remains the only Black president some 38 years later, and he used his platform to challenge urban racial segregation and discrimination. His presidential address, entitled "Geographies of Despair" (published in the Annals of the MG in 1978) focused on racial inequality and violence involving Black males. In 2012, Audrey Kobayashi, then president of theMG, announced the creation of the Harold M. Rose Award for Anti-Racist and Practice in Geography, on behalf of the MG council, noting his pioneering work in the study of urban racial segregation and discrimination. Geography has lost an extraordinarily important, but often overlooked figure. Dr. Rose made significant contributions to geographic understandings of segregation and racism as a socio- spatial process and yet too few in our discipline know and recognize his contributions. His graduate students tribute Dr. Harold Rose for their successes in life and many maintained a relationship with him well past retirement. UWM, his students, his friends and others whose lives he touched will dearly miss him. They all send their love to Mrs. Rose, Gregory and the grand and great grand children. A special thanks to Diane and Marvin Pratt who did their all for Dr. and Mrs. Rose.

Dr. Harold Milton Rose

January 8, 1930 - February 2, 2016