Robert Anderson

Robert Charles Anderson, 80, “a monumental figure” in the field of American genealogy, as described by his colleagues, whose “influence … is vast—perhaps incalculable,” died on February 17, 2025 at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire, as a result of complications from a heart attack.

Anderson earned degrees from Harvard College (A.B.), the California Institute of Technology (M.S.), and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst (M.A.). He “attempted three careers (one of them successfully),” he reported in 1990 to the members of the class of 1965 with whom he had entered Harvard. He enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1965, “joining the Army Security Agency and spending nearly two years in Monterey [CA] learning Russian,” he wrote. “The next two years I was in West Berlin, listening to Russians in East Germany, the most exciting event of this period being the invasion of Czechoslovakia on August 20, 1968, which I witnessed (and heard) from an unusual perspective.”

After his 1969 Army discharge, he returned to Harvard to complete his degree in biochemistry in 1971. He earned his Master’s degree at Caltech, also in biochemistry, two years later. “I found the study of molecular biology and genetics intellectually satisfying,” he later recalled, “and might have remained in the field, but I learned that I was not made to work in a laboratory.”

During his years at Caltech, Anderson became interested in the ancestry of his father’s mother, Katherine Gay Anderson, who was born in Prince Edward Island and was a descendant of John Gay, who had migrated from England to Dedham, Massachusetts by 1634. “This led me to the study of genealogy, which, to my total surprise, is exactly what my mind was intended to do.” During the 1970s and 1980s, he quickly established a reputation as a meticulous, rigorous genealogical researcher and scholar, whose goal, as he told his Harvard classmates, was “the elevation of genealogy as a serious academic discipline.” In 1978, he was elected as a Fellow of the American Society of Genealogists, of which he later served as president. He was also a coeditor of the American Genealogist and editorial consultant to the New England Historical and Genealogical Register.

“As early as 1976,” he wrote in 1995, “I began making notes about a project which initially had the name ‘Genealogical Dictionary of the Great Migration.’” In 1988, he developed a formal proposal for what he called the “Great Migration Study Project,” the goal of which has been to produce brief biographical sketches, based on the most recent scholarship, of all European, primarily English, immigrants to New England during the years 1620 to 1640. The New England Historic Genealogical Society (since 2024 officially known as American Ancestors) in 1988 agreed to sponsor the project, naming Anderson its Director, a position he held until his recent death.

“Bob’s legacy lives on in his prolific work—fifteen Great Migration books, twenty-five volumes of The Great Migration Newsletter, and his methodology book, Elements of Genealogical Analysis,” wrote Ryan Woods, President and CEO of American Ancestors in a recent message to the organization’s staff and officials. “Beyond his publications, he was a gifted teacher,” Woods added. “His lectures and online courses attracted thousands, and the heritage tours he led by land and sea through England, the Netherlands and Massachusetts were rich with historical insight and filled with joy, discovery, and lifelong friendships.”

Anderson’s other books included Puritan Pedigrees: The Deep Roots of the Great Migration to New England (2018) and Directions of a Town: A History of Harvard, Massachusetts (1976). His interests extended into many fields and disciplines, including philosophy, linguistics, baseball, genetics, model railroading, and history, about which he amassed a personal library comprising, by his estimate, more than 20,000 books.

A resident of Jaffrey, New Hampshire in recent years, Anderson was born in Bellows Falls, Vermont, May 24, 1944. He was the oldest of seven children of Albert Ernest Anderson and Frances Ellen (Hennessey) Anderson. He is survived by five siblings, Larry Anderson, Little Compton, RI; Christine O’Donnell, South Burlington, VT; Albert E. Anderson, Jr., Hinesburg, VT; Betsy Fowler, South Sutton, NH; and Barbara Brammer, Cambridge, MA. Bob is survived as well by eleven beloved nieces and nephews. His youngest brother, Bruce J. Anderson, predeceased him.

Bob also nurtured an extensive network of friends and acquaintances, in genealogical circles, among his college roommates, and beyond.

Plans for a memorial event will be made available at the website of the Fenton & Hennessey Funeral Home

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