Panagopoulos, Epaminondas (Nondas)（1915-1997）
Date Updated
10-20-2019
Department
History
Academic Rank
Professor
Year Retired from SJSU
1980
Educational Background
University of Chicago, 1952 Ph.D.
University of Athens, Political Science, 1939
University of Athens, Law, 1938
Teaching Experience
San Jose State University, 1956-1980
Wayne University (Detroit), 1952 -1956
Selected Publications
Hamilton 's Paybook, Wayne University Press.
The New Smyma Colony, Florida University Press.
Essays on the Histoiy and Meaning of Checks and Balances, University Press of America, 1985.
Many articles in the American Historical Review, William & Mary Quarterly, etc.
Files
Personal Commentary
I was born in Athens, Greece, in 1915. I was raised there, went to high school and to the University of Athens. After I received my law and political science degrees, I practiced for a while law, just before the Second World War. I did not like it, but the war interrupted my career.
I joined the Army as an officer. I was wounded with a bullet through my chest very close to the heart. I stayed one year in the hospital and, because I was too weak to work, I went for the next three years to the University as a student of philosophy.
After the war in 1946, I came with a scholarship to the University of Chicago, where I combined my previous background and became an American Historian. My Ph.D. degree is in Constitutional History of the United States, and I received it from the University of Chicago in 1952.
I was fortunate to get a job at Wayne University in Detroit, one month after I received my degree. I stayed four years at Wayne, but was very happy when in 1956 I was hired by SJSU (college at the time) and we moved to California from where I retired in 1980.
In the meantime, I married and we had two children.
We both taught at SJSU and have had a rewarding life in research and teaching. Since we are both Greeks we never forget our roots. We have continuously gone back to Greece in the summers and because my wife is an art historian, we have visited and worked also in many other parts of Europe. We presently live six months in California, four months in Greece and two in Paris.
After my retirement we moved to Berkeley, but our house was burned in 1991 during the big fire. Now we live in San Francisco, which we like very much. We continue to do research and I just had a book published in Greece on the "Greek Roots of the American Constitution."
Date Completed: 11/96
Adapted from: Biographies of Retired Faculty San Jose State University 1997: A Project of the Emeritus Faculty Association of San Jose State University. San Jose, CA: The University, 1997.