John Tracy Ellis

Life & Legacy

John Tracy Ellis (July 30, 1905 – October 16, 1992) was an American Catholic Church historian and priest.
Ellis was born and raised in Seneca, Illinois. Soon after he was ordained, he received a doctorate in history from Catholic University of America in Washington, where he researched with Peter Guilday to collect central documents of the American Catholic heritage.
He spent most of his career as a faculty member at Catholic University, but he also taught at the University of San Francisco between 1963 and 1976. He was a long serving executive secretary of the American Catholic Historical Association and editor of the Catholic Historical Review (1941–62). Ellis is well known for his 1952 argument that American Catholic scholars failed to measure up to European Catholic standards of scholarship and intellectual leadership.