Birthday profile

Kenneth Waltz

Kenneth Waltz, American political scientist and academic (died 2013)

Born
June 8, 1924
Died
May 12, 2013
Zodiac sign
Gemini
Birth year
1924

About Kenneth Waltz

Kenneth Neal Waltz (; June 8, 1924 – May 12, 2013) was an American political scientist who was a member of the faculty at both the University of California, Berkeley, and Columbia University and one of the most prominent scholars in the field of international relations. He was a veteran of both World War II and the Korean War. Waltz was one of the original founders of neorealism, or structural realism, in international relations theory and later became associated with the school of defensive neorealism. Waltz's theories have been extensively debated within the field of international relations. His 1979 book Theory of International Politics is the most assigned book in International Relations graduate training at U.S. universities. == Early life, education, and military service == Waltz was born on June 8, 1924, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he grew up and attended high school. He then enrolled at Oberlin College in Ohio, where he initially majored in mathematics. His college studies were interrupted by service in the United States Army from 1944 to 1946 during World War II. Waltz served in the Pacific theater of the war, rising in rank from private to 1st lieutenant, and was stationed in Japan during the U.S. occupation. He graduated from Oberlin with an A.B. degree in 1948, having switched his major to economics. He was a Phi Beta Kappa and also named an Amos Miller Scholar.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Career and life highlights

The world when Kenneth Waltz was born

Kenneth Waltz was born in 1924. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1924

  • #1 song"It Had to Be You" – Isham Jones
  • Top movieThe Thief of Bagdad (Douglas Fairbanks)
  • Best-selling bookSo Big – Edna Ferber

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentFirst Winter Olympics held in Chamonix, France
  • Top headlineCalvin Coolidge elected president in a landslide
  • Technology milestoneIBM founded
  • Defining fadMah-jongg craze sweeps America
  • Notable inventionSpiral-bound notebook
  • World population1.95 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderCalvin Coolidge
  • Sports championWashington Senators (World Series)
  • U.S. population114.1M

1924 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Kenneth Waltz's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19242026
Gas$0.21$3.45/gal
Average home$5,800$435,000
Average income$3,520$67,500
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.02$0.73
Population114.1M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Library of Congress, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.