Charles D. Blend

Charles Daniels Blend was born in Marion, Indiana on 18 July 1918, the oldest son of Gordon Bennett Blend (an attorney) and Huldah Daniels Blend. The family relocated to Hamilton, Ohio not long after Charles’ birth and subsequently moved to Columbus, Ohio. Charles Blend was awarded a B.A. with high distinction from Ohio State University (where he was Phi Beta Kappa) in 1949. After graduating he won a Fulbright Scholarship and went to France to study for a year at the Universite d’Aix-Marseille and while there met with Andre Malraux. He then returned to Ohio State for graduate work in Romance Languages and received his M.A. (1952) and Ph.D. (1955) degrees. His book Andre Malraux: Tragic Humanist (1963), an outgrowth of his doctoral dissertation, is considered by many scholars to be one of the best studies on Malraux in English. Grants enabled Blend to return to France in 1956 and in 1961 when he again met with Malraux.
Charles Blend remained at Ohio State as a teacher until 1962. He then accepted the position of Professor and Chairman of the Department of Romance Languages at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro where he worked from 1962 to 1966. In 1966 he accepted a similar position at Michigan State University in East Lansing. He was so well respected at MSU that he was approached several times about becoming a Dean.
Charles Blend also served in the United States Armed Forces during WWII. Enlisting in 1943 he was posted in Ardennes, Rhineland and Central Europe. He received an honorable discharge in 1946. Dr. Blend was something of an adventurer and even ran with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain. He was fluent in both French and Spanish. Charles Daniels Blend passed away in Michigan on 14 February 1971 following a battle with cancer. He was only 52 years of age and left behind a wife and two children.