Norman A. Graebner was the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 26 books. He joined the University of Virginia faculty in 1967 as the Edward R. Stettinius Professor of Modern American History and, in 1982, became the Randolph P. Compton Professor. In 1978, he was Harmsworth Professor at Oxford University; he was also one of the founders and early presidents of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR). The New York Review of Books identified Graebner, along with Gaddis Smith at Yale, as a national leader in diplomatic history. Graebner served as an officer in the major national historical associations and he received the highest award to a civilian from the US Military Academy for a program he developed and led at West Point. He died in May 2010 at the age of 94.

Edward M. Bennett is Emeritus Professor of History at Washington State University. The recipient of several outstanding teaching awards, he has written, co-authored, edited or co-edited 10 books dealing with US foreign relations. He is a past member of the executive committee of the Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association. He has been a member of the SHAFR Graebner Prize Committee, as well as its chair. He was also one of 10 American historians selected by the American Historical Association and the American Council of Learned Societies to participate in the colloquia authorized by Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev to assess the Soviet-American relationship in World War II.