Obituary: Irving Howards, professor emeritus of Political Science

Irving Howards, 87, of Amherst, professor emeritus of Political Science, died April 8.

 

Born in Milwaukee, he was a graduate of the University of Wisconsin, where he received his B.A., M.A. and Ph.D.

 

He joined the Political Science faculty in 1965 and served as director of the Bureau of Government Research, assistant to the chancellor and president and coordinator of Public Affairs. He also chaired a Board of Trustees committee to establish the Institute of Governmental Affairs, now the Donahue Institute, and served on a campus committee that established the Institute for Man and his Environment, now The Environmental Institute. He was also the research director of a state commission organized to study Massachusetts state government.

 

Much of his research focused on health and welfare policies and the relationships between state and local governments and the federal government.

 

Prior to his faculty appointment, he was a research assistant at the Institute of Labor and Industrial Relations and a research associate at the Institute of Government and Public Affairs, both at the University of Illinois. From 1957-65, he was an assistant and associate professor of government at Southern Illinois University, where he directed its Public Affairs Research Bureau. He was also responsible for SIU’s lobbying in the Illinois legislature.

 

He retired from the Political Science Department in 1987.

He leaves his wife, Frieda (Nankin) Howards.

Funeral services will be Wednesday, April 10, at 11 a.m. at the Jewish Community of Amherst, with burial following at the Jewish Community of Amherst Cemetery, Shutesbury.

Shiva will be held at the family’s home, 28 Columbia Circle, on Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday at 7 p.m.