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Frederick Dean McEvoy, 1956-1979
Biographical Note
Frederick Dean McEvoy was born on December 17, 1935, to Jesse and Reita Smith McEvoy
in North Platte,
Nebraska. McEvoy gained his initial experience in archaeology in
1951, as a summer assistant on an archaeological dig
in North Dakota, under the
direction of Dr. Richard P. Wheeler. Upon graduation from North
Platte High School in 1953, he
entered the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, completing one year of course work
as an anthropology major. McEvoy subsequently joined the
U.S. Navy and
was trained as an air traffic controller; he served in the Philippines from 1958
to 1961. He married Hilda Seitz
McEvoy in 1957; the couple had two
daughters, Karen and Gwen. After discharge from the Navy in 1961
, McEvoy returned to the University of Nebraska,
studying anthropology, with a focus on the Omaha Indians. Following graduation in
1964, he received a Woodrow Wilson Foundation
Fellowship for graduate study in anthropology at the University of Oregon . Studying under
Dr.
Vernon Dorjahn, McEvoy was awarded a National Science
Foundation Fellowship for field research in Liberia from 1967-1968. Upon completion of his Ph.D. at University of Oregon,
McEvoy taught anthropology at the University of North Carolina,
Chapel Hill, and subsequently at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia.
While at Marshall
University, McEvoy was also co-editor, along
with Dr. Svend Holsoe,
of volume 6 and 7 of the
Liberian Studies Journal
(1975-1977).
McEvoy left academia in 1979, moved
to Denver, and initially
worked for the non-profit organization, Denver Opportunity.
From 1981 to 1989, he served as the Director of
Research and Education at the Colorado State Civil Rights Division. In the
mid-1990s, McEvoy worked for the West Virginia Division of
Culture and History in Charleston. McEvoy
relocated to his hometown of North Platte, Nebraska, in 2002; he
passed away on April 1, 2007.
