Stephen Ambrose's plagiarism of Thomas Childers's work

Ambrose/Plagiarism

Purdue University's Online Writing Lab (OWL) is a respected resource for writers. In an introduction to its guidelines on plagiarism, it is noted that "There are few intellectual offenses more serious than plagiarism in academic and professional contexts" (Stolley, Brizee, and Paiz, 2013). The serious charges leveled at historian Stephen Ambrose -- that he plagiarized the work of Thomas Childers -- are valid.

Ambrose failed to properly credit Childers for his work. Childers' found a stash of letters and photographs in his grandmother's house and was able to build on the stash with additional information. Ambrose used his friend George McGovern as a primary resource. Although there may have been general similarities in the stories each author heard, recollections would have reflected the unique personalities of the principals involved. Just as no two attendees at a party will have the same accounting of events, the pilots and crews cited in Childers' and Ambrose's books would have likewise had different stories to tell, especially when stories were told years after the events took place.

Ambrose attempted to use a trick most often employed by high school students or college freshmen. He substituted synonyms in someone else's sentences and paragraph structure in an effort to make the writing his own. Ambrose does not use his own words and his own voice in these instances, for the writing still parallels too closely that of the original. In some cases, Ambrose's wording is identical. It is an egregious offence for a writer of Ambrose's caliber and reputation. It is difficult to imagine that Ambrose did not understand what he was doing or comprehend the serious nature of his actions.