Norma Hervey is a professor emerita of history at Luther College, having retired in 2006. Hervey received her BA in History at the University of Akron in 1956, her MA in Library Science at State University of New York, Geneseo, in 1972, her MA in History at St. Bonaventure University in 1980, and her PhD in History at the University of Minnesota in 1991. She was a member of the American honor society for students and professors of history, Phi Alpha Theta, joining as an undergraduate student in 1955 and again as a graduate student in 1979.

Throughout her academic career, Hervey has served as both a librarian and a professor. At St. Bonaventure University, she worked as a Reference Librarian, Catalog Librarian, and ultimately became the Head of Technical Services from 1975-1980. At the University of Arkansas, she served as an associate professor and Coordinator of Cataloguing for a year, before moving on to Gustavus Adolphus College. There she served as an associate professor as well as the Head of Technical Services from 1981-1989. Finally, she came to Luther College to become Head Librarian from 1988-1997 and professor of history, 1998-2006.

As an instructor, Hervey specialized in 19th-20th century American History, specifically immigration and community history, but her research interests extend to the Holocaust and ethnic issues in Central and Eastern Europe, where she has traveled extensively to pursue and instruct in these fields. An avid international traveler, she has visited Italy, the Czech Republic, Russia, Denmark, Germany, the Slovak Republic, England, Scotland, Poland, Norway, Lithuania, and Ukraine. She is a Founding Fellow of the Eastern Europe Institute, and spent her 1994-1995 sabbatical teaching United States history at Palackeho University in Olomouc, Moravia. In 2004, she was requested to present at the 22nd annual International Congress of the Czechoslovak Academy of the Arts and Sciences. In the past, she has led several study abroad trips to Central and Eastern Europe, including a course in January of 2010, “History 139: The Holocaust: History and Legacies.” Hervey has also been gifted with travel opportunities through research grants and the Fulbright Foundation.

Hervey has the distinction of winning not one, but two Fulbright awards – the most anyone is permitted to receive by the Fulbright Foundation. In 2001, she was awarded with the Fulbright appointment to teach immigration history in Prague. Her second Fulbright came in 2007, offering the opportunity to teach United States history at Moldova State University in Chisinau, Moldova.

In addition to the Fulbright awards, Hervey has received several other grants and awards, including the Blandin Foundation Research Grant in 1985, and the James J. Hill research fellowship in both 1985 and 1986. In 2008, she received a $170,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support a five-week program, “Multiple Perspectives on the Holocaust Summer Institute.” The program was held in Washington, D.C., and Central Europe from June 26–July 29 that same year.

Hervey has been listed in the Directory of American Scholars since 1998, and has been a member of the Organization of American Historians, the Iowa Library Association, the Intellectual Freedom Committee, the Iowa Private Academic Libraries Board, the CHOICE editorial board, the College Library News editorial board, and the American Library Association.

Ref: Luther News, Luther College, January 2008; Newsbeat, Luther College, October 2006; PARTNERs biography, Luther College.