Winter 2023

Harvard Vaughan Knowles was born on March 11, 1935, in Newport, Maine, one of seven children, to Elbert and Bertie Knowles. After his graduation from Skowhegan High School, he enrolled at Tufts University, where he graduated in 1958 with a BA in English. From 1958 to 1960, he served as a clerk filing papers for the United States Army at Fort Gordon, Augusta, Georgia, an experience for which he was later grateful; it exposed him to a diverse group of people, he said, and taught him military discipline (he also joked about all the Purple Hearts he acquired from paper cuts). His first teaching position was at Loomis-Chaffee School in Windsor, Connecticut (1962-1974), where he taught English and served as Department Chair. He somehow found the time for graduate school and earned his MA in English from Duke University in 1968. His passion was Shakespeare, and his thesis focused on the Bard’s plays. more