Editing Lewis Mumford (section)

== Life ==
[[File:Lewis Mumford House, Amenia, NY.jpg|thumb|Mumford's house in Amenia|alt=A white house with black shutters and brick chimneys seen from its front left corner. Shrubs and trees obscure the view on the sides.]]

===Early life and education===
Mumford was born in [[Flushing, Queens|Flushing]], [[Queens]], New York, and graduated from [[Stuyvesant High School]] in 1912.<ref>{{cite journal |url=http://www.odu.edu/ao/instadv/quest/cityascommunity.html |title=City As Community: The Life And Vision Of Lewis Mumford |first=Robert |last=Wojtowicz |journal=Quest |publisher=[[Old Dominion University]] |date=Jan 2001 |volume=4 |issue=1 |access-date=October 31, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071009091414/http://www.odu.edu/ao/instadv/quest/cityascommunity.html |archive-date=October 9, 2007 |url-status=dead }}</ref> He studied at the [[City College of New York]] and [[The New School|The New School for Social Research]], but became ill with tuberculosis and never finished his degree. In 1918 he joined the [[United States Navy|Navy]] to serve in [[World War I]] and was assigned as a radio electrician.<ref name="lmc-c"/><ref name="dah">{{cite web |url=http://arthistorians.info/mumfordl|title=Mumford, Lewis| editor-last=Sorensen| editor-first=Lee |publisher=Dictionary of Art Historians| access-date=October 12, 2010}}</ref> He was discharged in 1919 and became associate editor of ''[[The Dial]]'', an influential [[modernist]] literary journal. He later worked for ''[[The New Yorker]]'' where he wrote architectural criticism and commentary on urban issues.

===First book===
Mumford's earliest books in the field of literary criticism have had a lasting influence on contemporary American literary criticism. His first book was ''The Story of Utopias'' (1922), an insightful exploration of the many visions of a better world that influenced the development of modern urban planning theory. In ''The Golden Day'' (1926), he argued for a mid-19th-century American literary canon comprising [[Herman Melville]], [[Ralph Waldo Emerson]], [[Henry David Thoreau]], [[Nathaniel Hawthorne]] and [[Walt Whitman]], all of whom he argued reflected an antebellum American culture of the period that would be destroyed by the late-19th-century social changes wrought by the [[American Civil War]] and [[industrialization]] of the United States.<ref name=aronoff/> ''[[Herman Melville (book)|Herman Melville]]'' (1929), which combined an account of Melville's life with an interpretive discussion of his work,<ref>{{cite book| first=Donald L.|last=Miller|author-link=Donald L. Miller| title=Lewis Mumford: A Life| publisher=Grove Press| year=1989| page=274| isbn=9780802139344 }}</ref> was an important part of the [[Herman Melville#Melville revival and Melville studies|Melville revival]].<ref name=aronoff>{{cite book| page=303| first=Eric| last=Aronoff| chapter=The Melville Revival|title=Herman Melville in Context|editor-first=Kevin J. |editor-last=Hayes| publisher=Cambridge University Press| year=2018| isbn=9781316766965}}</ref>

===Correspondence===
Mumford was a close friend of the psychologist [[Henry Murray]], with whom he corresponded extensively from 1928 until the 1960s on topics including [[Herman Melville]], psychology, American values and culture, and the nature of the self.<ref>{{cite book| first=Frank G. Jr. |chapter=Introduction| last=Novak| title=In Old Friendship: The Correspondence of Lewis Mumford and Henry A. Murray, 1928–1981| publisher=Syracuse University Press| year=2007| pages=1–29| isbn=9780815631132 }}</ref>

===Urban planning===
In his early writings on life in an [[urban area]], Mumford was optimistic about human abilities, arguing that the human race would use electricity and [[mass communication]] to build a better world for all humankind. Mumford later took a more pessimistic stance on the sweeping technological improvements brought by the [[Second Industrial Revolution]]. His early architectural criticism helped to bring wider public recognition to the work of [[Henry Hobson Richardson]], [[Louis Sullivan]] and [[Frank Lloyd Wright]].

===Honours===
Mumford was elected to the [[American Philosophical Society]] in 1941 and the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] in 1947.<ref>{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Lewis+Mumford&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2023-04-24 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Lewis Mumford |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/lewis-mumford |access-date=2023-04-24 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |date=February 9, 2023 |language=en}}</ref> In 1963, Mumford received the [[Frank Jewett Mather]] Award for art criticism from the [[College Art Association]].<ref name="caa">{{cite web|url=http://www.collegeart.org/awards/matherpast|title=Awards|publisher=The College Art Association|access-date=October 11, 2010}}</ref> Mumford received the [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]] in 1964.<ref name="lmc-c">{{cite web|url=http://mumford.albany.edu/mumford/chronology_lm.htm|title=Chronology of Mumford's Life|publisher=Lewis Mumford Center|access-date=October 12, 2010}}</ref> In 1975 Mumford was made an honorary [[British honours system|Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire]] (KBE).<ref name="lmc-c"/> In 1976, he was awarded the [[Prix mondial Cino Del Duca]].<ref name="lmc-c"/> In 1986, he was awarded the [[National Medal of Arts]].<ref name="lmc-c"/>

===Further publications===
He served as the architectural critic for ''The New Yorker'' magazine for over 30 years. His 1961 book, ''[[The City in History]]'', received the [[National Book Award]].<ref name="lmc-c"/><ref name=nba1962/>

===Retirement===
Lewis Mumford died at the age of 94 at [[Lewis Mumford House|his home]] in [[Amenia (town), New York|Amenia, New York]], on January 26, 1990.<ref name="lmc-c"/> Nine years later the house was listed on the [[National Register of Historic Places]]. His wife Sophia died in 1997, at age 97.<ref>New York Times May 2, 1997</ref>