Charles J. Holden

Professor of History

Charles J. Holden

Biography

Chuck Holden has taught at SMCM since 1999. His books include: In the Great Maelstrom: Conservatives in Post-Civil War South Carolina (2002) and The New Southern University: Academic Freedom and Liberalism at UNC (2011). He is also a co-author on Republican Populist: Spiro Agnew and the Origin of Donald Trump's America (2019).  His op-eds have appeared in The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, The Charlotte Observer, the Des Moines Register. and the History News Network.

Areas of Research Specialization

  • 19th and 20th Century U.S. History
  • History of American South
  • History of Academic Freedom

Areas of Teaching Specialization

  • 19th and 20th U.S. History
  • The Great Depression and New Deal
  • The Civil War Era

Education

  • B.S. in Business Administration at St. John's University (MN), 1985
  • M.A. in History at Creighton University, 1990
  • Ph.D. in United States History at Penn State University, 1997

Spotlight

  • The New Southern University: Academic Freedom and Liberalism at UNC

    This book examines the emergence of the University of North Carolina as a modern southern university. It focuses especially on the university's embrace of academic freedom as an institutional value.

  • In the Great Maelstrom: Conservatism in Post-Civil War South Carolina

    This book examines the persistence of a southern conservative ideological tradition following defeat in the Civil War. It features intellectual biographies of four South Carolinians and covers the 1830s through the 1930s.