David M. Kennedy is the Donald J. McLachlan Professor of History, Emeritus, at Stanford University, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian specializing in 20th-century American history, the Great Depression, and the American West. He has taught at Stanford since 1967 and is the founding director of the university’s Bill Lane Center for the American West. He has been recognized for his excellence in teaching and in 2005 received the Hoagland Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching.

David is the author of numerous influential works on American history, including Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945, for which he won the Pulitzer Prize for History. Other acclaimed works include Birth Control in America: The Career of Margaret Sanger, winner of the Bancroft Prize, and Over Here: The First World War and American Society, a Pulitzer Prize finalist.

David has helped shape historical scholarship as editor of the Oxford History of the United States series, and through his contributions to widely used history texts, including The American Pageant. He has also served as the Harold Vyvyan Harmsworth Professor of American History at the University of Oxford.

Professor Kennedy holds a Ph.D. in American Studies from Yale University, an M.A. in American Studies from Yale University, and a B.A. in History from Stanford University.