Abigail Thernstrom

Born in 1936, Abigail Mann was raised in Croton-on-Hudson, 30 miles north of New York City, on Finney Farm, a left-wing sanctuary that John Reed repaired to on his return from the Soviet Union. Her father was an unsuccessful businessman who "never made a dime," while her mother was slowly dying of breast cancer. After graduating from Barnard College, Abigail arrived at Harvard as a graduate student in Middle Eastern studies and later migrated to the government department. In the fall of 1958, she was set up on a blind date with Stephan Thernstrom, a reserved, pipe-smoking graduate student in American history. Abigail Mann and Stephan Thernstrom met for their first date at an I.F. Stone lecture. Two and a half months later, they married. While Stephan made a name for himself as a bright young scholar, Abigail raised their two children, putting aside her graduate work from the time she became pregnant with Melanie until 1973, when the family settled in Lexington Massachusetts. She completed her dissertation in 1975. In 1997 the Thernstroms' magnum opus, America in Black and White, was published by the Free Press. The product of seven years of research, it was written with the support of several right-wing think tanks and foundations, including a $180,000 grant from the John M. Olin Foundation.