Wilmer C. Harris

Wilmer C. Harris (standing 1st on the right)
with his Company at the M.M.A.

As a boy, Wilmer Harris attended the Clay School in Detroit and sang as a choirboy in Old Mariner's Episcopal Church.  A copy of Harris's 1898 diary can be found in the archives of the Greater West Bloomfield Historical Society.  The journal was written while Wilmer was a 17 year old Junior cadet at the M.M.A. and several of his writings enhance the pages of this website.

Dr. Harris received his undergraduate degree at the University of Chicago, his masters degree from the University of Michigan, and his doctorate from the University of Chicago.   He taught history at:

Grinnell College, Grinnell, Iowa
Butler University, Indianapolis, Indiana
Ohio State University and
Ohio University

He became the head of the history department at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio.   He was president of the Ohio Teacher's Association and managing editor of the Ohio Teacher Magazine.  To make his lectures more interesting he traveled extensively in Europe, the Middle East and Russia.

Dr. Harris followed his passion and purchased a former county fairground east of Columbus, Ohio and managed it as a farm.  His prize possessions included Ted and Fred: a team of matched purebred Percheron horses who came in second in an Ohio State Fair pulling contest.

After his death in 1963, his widow Mary established the Wilmer C. Harris Scholarship Fund at Ohio University in his memory for highly qualified history students.

Excerpts from a biography prepared in 1995 by Wilmer's daughter, Elizabeth Coggill.