Paul M. Zall and the humor in history

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Paul M. Zall always found the humor in history.

How many authors and editors have titles such as “Blue & Gray Laughing” and “The Wit & Wisdom of the Founding Fathers?” Zall, a longtime Cal State L.A. professor and Huntington Library scholar who died Dec. 16, found the funny where few others looked.

One of Zall’s sons, Andy, said his father even kept a file cabinet filled with jokes. “He always wrote the underground paper wherever he was,” Andy Zall said. At Cal State L.A., that meant he was the uncredited publisher of ‘The Weakly Beast.”

The news obituary on Zall can be found here.

-- Keith Thursby