Rate My Professor Stanley Palmer

Stanley Palmer is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Texas at Arlington, where he taught for 41 years from 1973 until his retirement in 2014. He earned a B.A. from Brown University in 1966 and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1973 under Professor David S. Landes. Palmer chaired the History Department during 1982-1987 and 1995-1996, served as graduate advisor during the transition after the Humanities Ph.D. program ended, and was the driving force behind the Transatlantic History Ph.D. program established in 1998. This innovative program shifted focus from national histories to transatlantic interactions involving Europe, North America, Africa, Latin America, and South America, incorporating historical maps from UTA's Special Collections and hiring expert cartographers such as David Buisseret and Imre Demhardt.

Palmer's academic interests center on British and Irish history, the British Empire, comparative police history, and the evolution of colonies into nations with attention to indigenous cultures and self-governance. His key publications include Police and Protest in England and Ireland, 1780-1850 (Cambridge University Press, 1988), Economic Arithmetic: A Guide to the Statistical Sources of English Commerce, Industry, and Finance, 1700-1850 (Garland Publishing, 1977), Essays on Frontiers in World History (co-editor, University of Texas Press, 1981), Essays on the History of North American Discovery and Exploration (co-editor, Texas A&M University Press, 1988), and a chapter 'The Power of Numbers: Settler and Native in Ireland, America, and South Africa, 1600-1900' in Transatlantic History (Texas A&M University Press, 2006). He supervised numerous doctoral dissertations and influenced the field through his scholarship. Palmer received major honors including the UTA President's Award for Undergraduate Teaching (1994), membership in the UTA Academy of Distinguished Teachers (1996), nomination as a Minnie Stevens Piper Professor (1999), Gertrude Golladay Memorial Award for Outstanding Teaching in Liberal Arts (2009), UTA Award for Outstanding Research Achievement (1989), Wilson Center for Scholars Fellowship (1981), NACADA Outstanding Adviser Award (2001), and served as President of the Western Conference on British Studies.