Harry Alfred Gailey

Background

Harry Gailey was born on the 4th of December, 1926 in Kansas City, Missouri, United States.

Education

Harry Gailey graduated from the University of California at Los Angeles with a Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1958.

Career

Harry Gailey, a veteran of the U.S. Army Air Forces who was also in the Army Reserve from 1946 to 1955, he worked as a mechanical and civil engineer in southern California from 1946 until 1952 at the beginning of his career.

Gailey's academic career began at Northwest Missouri State University, where he was an associate professor and department chair from 1957 to 1962. He then joined the San Jose State University faculty as an assistant professor, becoming a full professor in 1968 and later retiring as professor emeritus.

Gailey not only taught a wide range of history courses at SJSU but also traveled the world gathering information to use in the books he authored, which numbered well over thirty. Gailey began his writing in the early 60's concentrating mainly on the African continent but then moved on to his real passion, WWII, the War in the Pacific, which was the title of one of his many books. Gailey's style was to spend hours interviewing the men and women who were involved with each battle campaign to get the truth of what occurred and then he would add his own flair of writing to bring those times and actions to the reader.

Among his many books are "A History of the Gambia" that was published in 1964, "History of Africa from Earliest Times to 1800" and "The road to Aba" in 1970, "History of Africa from 1800 to Present" in 1972, "Africa: Troubled Continent" in 1982, "Bougainville, 1943-1945: The Forgotten Campaign" in 1991 and "MacArthur Strikes Back: Decision at Buna, New Guinea, 1942-1943" in 2000 and latest "MacArthur's Victory: The War in New Guinea, 1943-1944" in 2004.

Achievements

• Gailey was the first person local TV and radio stations would contact when some trouble broke out in an obscure point of the word because he was able to give them the information they required for their story.
  
  While at San Jose, Harry was named an outstanding professor and a president's scholar, one of only a half dozen faculty members to have won both awards.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The War in the Pacific

    (The book chronicles all significant actions - from the ea...)

    1995
  • MacArthur's Victory: The War in New Guinea, 1943-1944

    (In March 1942, General Douglas MacArthur faced an enemy w...)

    2004
  • Bougainville

    (The 1943 invasion of Bougainville, largest and northernmo...)

    1991
  • Historical Dictionary of the Gambia

    (The Gambia's history includes entries on significant pers...)

    1975
  • The Liberation of Guam, 21 July-10 August, 1944

    (The book offers a day-by-day account of the retaking of G...)

    1988
  • MacArthur Strikes Back

    (MacArthur at Buna is the first book-length treatment of t...)

    2000
  • Historical encyclopedia of the United States Marine Corps

    (The Marine Corps has had a long and varied history of act...)

    1998
  • Howlin' Mad vs. the Army

    (Marine Corps Lt. Gen. Holland M. (Howlin' Mad) Smith reli...)

    1986
  • Lugard and the Abẹokuta Uprising 1982
  • Peleliu, 1944 1983
  • A History of the Gambia 1964
  • Sir Donald Cameron, Colonial Governor 1974
  • History of Africa from Earliest Times to 1800 1970
  • Clifford, Imperial Proconsul 1982
  • The Road to Aba 1970
  • History of Africa from 1800 to Present 1972

Connections

Gailey was married to Rosalie. They had five children, Richard, Laurel (Paul) Bodenshot, Karen (Ken) Barker, Nancy (Dan) Joyce, Jennifer (Scott) Niemann, and 12 grand-children.

Wife:

Rosalie Gailey

Son:

Richard Gailey

Daughter:

Laurel (Paul) Bodenshot

Daughter:

Karen (Ken) Barker

Daughter:

Nancy (Dan) Joyce

Daughter:

Jennifer (Scott) Niemann