Indiana University emeritus professor James H. Madison was awarded the 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award from the biennial Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Awards.
Indiana Humanities president and CEO Keira Amstutz said her group is “delighted to acknowledge the work of someone who is not only a respected historian but also a passionate believer in the power of the humanities to inform and improve Hoosiers’ lives.”
Although Madison is one of Indiana’s most prolific historians, he describes Indiana history as something he “fell into” during his first year teaching in the IU History Department. “I knew very little about it but I learned and got interested,” Madison said. “And then it was just there, it was all around me. I found things all around me that were interesting.”
Director of Grants for Indiana Humanities George Hanlin was one of many students to pass through Madison’s classes and the two have maintained a close working relationship since. Hanlin said the same qualities Madison exhibited as a professor led to his award.
“He tells history in a way that’s engaging, that people in the street like you or I can understand and read and enjoy,” said Hanlin. “He’s a master storyteller and that I think is what his strength really is.”
Madison says engaging non-historians and elevating public conversation are two of his primary goals as a writer. “I work really hard, as most historians do, to write in a way that connects the best of scholarship to the American reading public,” Madison said. “To people who are willing to sit down, read a book, and think about it. I believe passionately we need to read, we need to think, and then we should be prepared to talk and act.”
Madison has published numerous books on Indiana history over the past four decades. His most recent, The Ku Klux Klan in the Heartland, is shortlisted for the nonfiction category of the Indiana Authors Awards. Madison is also the recipient of the James P. Holland Award for exemplary teaching and the IU Student Alumni Association’s “Student Choice” award. He was designated as an Indiana Living Legend by the Indiana Historical Society in 2016 alongside former governor Mitch Daniels.
According to the Authors Awards website, winners of the Lifetime Achievement award must have “significant connections to Indiana” and “demonstrate excellence and considerable contributions to the literary arts both statewide and nationally.” Previous recipients include historical fiction writer James Alexander Thom, poet Mari Evans, and screenwriter Dan Wakefield.
As winner, Madison receives $5,000 and an additional $500 to donate to an Indiana library of his choosing.
