Jeremiah Denis Matthias Ford (Jul. 2, 1873 – Nov. 13, 1958), professor of Spanish and Latin American studies, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Jeremiah Denis Ford and Mary Agnes Collins. As a young boy, he studied at the Thorndike Grammar School in his hometown, before completing his secondary schooling in Europe. From 1886 to 1887, he attended the North Monastery Christian Brothers School in Cork, Ireland, followed by a year in the South Kensington Science & Art Department in London, England, from 1887 to 1888.

There, he displayed proficiency in a number of academic fields. Ford was awarded Distinction in Chemistry & Math in the South Kensington Science & Art Department Examinations in 1888, as well as First Scholar & Gold Medal in English and the Silver Medal for German from the Intermediate Education Board of Dublin, Ireland.

In 1891, Ford enrolled at Harvard Law School, where he attained honors his first year. After one year at the Law School, Ford attended Harvard College where he founded the Catholic Club of Harvard University in 1893. He graduated summa cum laude from the College in 1894. By 1895, he had completed his master’s degree program at the Graduate School, and he was appointed Instructor in French & Italian, thus becoming the first Catholic ever hired by Harvard University. By 1897, Ford completed his Ph.D. program in Romance Philology. His thesis was titled Old Spanish Sibilants. After a brief period of study abroad at the École des Hautes Études in Paris, he returned to Harvard as an Instructor of French & Spanish in 1898.

In 1900, Ford helped organize the Cuban Summer School program at Harvard, the project that is said to have sparked his interest in Latin America. During the session, he delivered a total of eighteen lectures discussing the social, commercial, and political history of the United States alongside fellow Harvard faculty member, Philippe Belknap Marcou. He also delivered two lectures on child psychology in Spanish authored by a colleague, Professor Josiah Royce. Four years later, Ford and philologist colleague, Elijah Clarence Hills, co-published a textbook on Spanish Grammar. Soon after, Ford established himself as a pioneer in the field of Latin American studies with an article on Spanish American literature, published in the Catholic Encyclopedia in 1912. In 1929, he founded the Harvard Council on Hispano-American Studies.

J.D.M. Ford married Anna Winfred Fearns, also of Cambridge, in 1902. Together, they had four children. In 1907, he was appointed Smith Professor of the French & Spanish Languages & Literature, thus becoming the youngest ever professor at Harvard at the age of forty-four. He held this prestigious position—previous holders included Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1836 to 1854) and James Russell Lowell (1854 and 1891), until his retirement in 1943, when he became Smith Professor Emeritus.

Ford received several honorary degrees, including the degree of Doctor of Letters from the University of Toulouse, France; National University of Ireland in Dublin; Trinity College, Dublin; Bowdoin University; and Harvard University, as well as a degree of Doctor of Humane Letters from Fordham University. In 1937 the University of Notre Dame awarded Ford its Laetare Medal, given annually to an outstanding member of the Roman Catholic laity. He held the presidency of a number of scholarly societies and associations, among them the Dante Society of America, the Italian Historical Society of Massachusetts, the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, the American Catholic Historical Association, and the Humanities Research Association of England. He also served as the vice-president of a number of organizations, including the Modern Language Association of America and the Hispanic Society of America. In 1937 he was awarded the

Jeremiah Denis Matthias Ford died on November 13, 1956 at his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was remembered as “a man who left a definite impression on all those who came into contact with him.” (Leavitt, 23)

In his lifetime, Ford became the youngest professor ever hired at Harvard University, as well as the university’s first ever Roman Catholic professor. Ford was fluent in Arabic, Basque, Gaelic, German, Romanian, Sanskrit, and at least forty-one Romance languages and dialects. He was a pioneer in the field of Latin American studies in the United States and played an important role in furthering Hispano-American studies at Harvard.


Further Reading

1. The Jeremiah Denis Matthias Ford Papers are held at the Harvard University Archives, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

2. Doyle, Henry Grattan, “J. D. M. Ford Receives Laetare Medal,” The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 21, No. 8 (May, 1937): 619-622.

3. Leavitt, Sturgis E. “J. D. M. Ford (1873-1958),” Hispania, Vol. 42, No. 1 (Mar., 1959)L 22-23

4. Obituary: New York Times, November 14, 1958.