BOSTON (AP) — Author Howard Zinn, whose leftist “A People’s History of the United States” sold millions of copies and became an alternative to mainstream texts, has died. He was 87.
Daughter Myla Kabat-Zinn says Zinn died Wednesday of a heart attack in Santa Monica, Calif.
Zinn was a teacher and activist as well as a historian with an openly left-wing point of view. His 1980 “People’s History” celebrated workers and picked apart even liberal presidents like Franklin Roosevelt. It was admired by celebrities such as Bruce Springsteen and Ben Affleck.
He said his idea was that “the orthodox viewpoint has already been done a thousand times.”
He taught for many years at Boston University.
