Leonard Woods Labaree was Farnam Professor Emeritus of History at Yale University, where he earned his Ph.D. in 1926. He was awarded the Gold Medal of the International Benjamin Franklin Society in 1961, while serving as editor in chief for the Papers of Benjamin Franklin series, sponsored jointly by Yale University and the American Philosophical Society. He also served on the Council of the Institute of Early American History and Culture, the Secretary of the Navy's Advisory Committee on Naval History, and was the State Historian of Connecticut, 1941-51.