Dr. James W. Clark Jr.,

English Professor Emeritus at North Carolina State University, earned his AB in English PBK at UNC-Chapel Hill (1965) and a Duke MA and PhD by 1970. His undergraduate degree was supported by a national 4-H scholarship in entomology; a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship paid for his graduate study at Duke. In 1967 he joined NC State’s faculty in English. There he spent his entire professional career, except for a 1972-73 leave at the University of Rochester. Through 2005-06 he focused his academic career primarily on the cultural geography and literary history of North Carolina, his native state. In addition to on-campus teaching and research, for twenty years Dr. Clark led NCSU’s Humanities Extension/Publications Program, as he and his staff produced numerous video treatments of contemporary North Carolina writers, primarily in a series called Talk About Writing. This innovative outreach program also produced social studies textbooks with video ancillaries for grades four through seven in North Carolina public schools. In 1992, Dr. Clark edited and wrote an introduction to Thomas Wolfe’s novella The Lost Boy for UNC Press. German and French editions of this work of fiction subsequently appeared.

James Clark has served as president of The Thomas Wolfe Society as well as The North Carolina Literary and Historical Association and The Paul Green Foundation, winning the R. Hunt Parker Award for this service. In addition, he published an expanded edition of his 1984 social history of North Carolina’s 4-H youth development program. This new book entitled Clover All Over: North Carolina’s First 4-H Century appeared in 2010. In 2012 the William C. Friday Award for Distinguished Service in Retirement was presented to him for this work plus his gratis instruction in NCSU’s Encore/OLLI Program beginning in 1992. At senior centers and continuing care assisted living centers in the Raleigh area, life writing workshops continue today under his volunteer leadership.

Dr. Clark completed a decade as president of The North Caroliniana Society in 2024. During that time he won the John Tyler Caldwell Award from the NC Humanities Council in 2020. He had become a member of the National 4-H Hall of Fame (2017) and the NC Literary Hall of Fame (2018). That year he published a social and political history about that portion of his native Warren County of which his hometown has occasionally been the center. This work is entitled Finding and Keeping Vaughan, North Carolina: Our Hometown. One of seven children in a family that farmed tobacco and grain, he clerked in his father’s service station/general store on US 158 from age nine until graduation from Littleton High School in 1961. Working behind the counter was his best preparation for eventually teaching in university classrooms.

Professor Clark has served on the board of Carolina Public Humanities at UNC-Chapel Hill. On University Day in 2023, he was honored as a Distinguished Alumnus. He remains a strong advocate for the professional development of public school teachers and 4-H agents, having also chaired and co-chaired the North Carolina 4-H History and Learning Center Committee at Camp Millstone. This Center was dedicated in April 2016. In larger service to his community, he served for a decade as secretary to the board of Habitat for Humanity of Wake County. Earlier this year The Order of the Long Leaf Pine was conferred on him by Governor Josh Stein.