Walter Kamphoefner earned his Ph.D. at the University of Missouri-Columbia in 1978 and has been a Professor of History at Texas A&M University since 1988. As an immigration historian, he served as president of the Society for German American Studies from 2015 to 2017, receiving that organization’s Distinguished Achievement Award in 2024. He was a Senior Fulbright Lecturer at the University of Bremen, Germany, in 1986–87 and at Osnabrueck University, Germany, in 1998–99, and was the OAH Distinguished Lecturer from 2009 to 2017.
He has published widely in the field of immigration and ethnicity, with articles in four languages and three books published in both German and English versions.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz selected one of his books as a gift for his hosts at the Blair House on his recent trip to Washington, D.C., in recognition of our shared history and the importance of immigration to our country, as reported by the TAMU Department of History.
