Archibald Cary Coolidge

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From 1893 on, he taught various history courses at Harvard, first as an instructor, from 1899 on as assistant professor, and in 1908, he was made a full professor of history.

Coolidge today is recognized as having turned the Harvard College Library into a major research institution. Coolidge helped make the Harvard Library "one of the best organized libraries for scholars and students as well as one of the great libraries of the world." He is further credited with bringing the study of history of Latin America, the Far East, and the Slavic countries to the history department of Harvard. In 1908, he was appointed to the Harvard Library Council and was chairman of this council in 1909. In 1910, he became the first director of the Harvard University Library. Coolidge's tenure saw the building of the Widener Library. To detail his efforts in making the Harvard Library a centerpiece for students at the university, "The first to hold this office, Professor Coolidge gave a creative interpretation to its functions and made it an essential part of University organization. He kept before the University and its friends a broad and comprehensive idea of the Library and its possibilities, and had the satisfaction of seeing the Harvard Library under his administration reach an assured position among the great libraries of the world. This result was due in large to his own wisdom, vision, patient skill, and interest in every side of the Library's welfare. He encouraged equally the acquisition of unique special collections, the prompt and steady purchase of books asked for, and improved facilities for work by members of the University and by visiting scholars." His own department described his personal characteristics: "He gave himself to history; and it was characteristic of him that his gifts to the Department in his lifetime should take permanent form in his bequests... One prejudice he did not rise above- a prejudice for intellectual distinction; but to him this was a thing of many kinds... His attachments were of the heart. He was a man of strong feeling, quick to anger at injustice, profoundly stirred by sympathy. He hated the waste of useless friction and mis-directed strength... His mind was essentially political: he knew that he lived in a world of men, not of ideas." Coolidge's time at Harvard shows his true dedication to Academia, with his emphasized focus on history and the improvement of the Harvard Library. He was an essential member of the Harvard Faculty and made improvements to the college that would prove to be long-lasting.

Between college terms and parallel to his post at Harvard, Coolidge also pursued a career in diplomacy, which fit his travel interests and his desire and aptitude for learning languages well. He held posts as secretary to the American legation in Saint Petersburg, Russia (1890–1891), as private secretary to the American minister in France (1892), and as secretary to the American legation in Vienna (1893).

At the end of World War I, more important assignments followed. Coolidge joined the Inquiry study group established by Woodrow Wilson. The U.S. State Department sent him in 1918 to Russia to report on the situation there. In 1919, he was made the head of the so-called Coolidge Mission, which was "appointed by the American Delegation on 27 December and set up headquarters in Vienna.". Secretary of State Robert Lansing informed Coolidge in a telegram dated December 26, 1918, that "You are hereby assigned to the American Commission to observe political conditions in Austria-Hungary and neighboring countries.". Coolidge and his group in Vienna analyzed the state of affairs on Central Europe and the Balkans and made recommendations for the benefit of the U.S. participants at the Paris Peace Conference, 1919.

In 1921, Coolidge worked as a negotiator for the American Relief Administration and helped organize the humanitarian aid to Russia after the famine of 1921. Coolidge also was one of the founders of the Council on Foreign Relations, which grew out of the Inquiry study group, and served as the first editor of its publication Foreign Affairs from 1922 until his death in 1928.

Coolidge was also a member of the Monticello Association, which was created in 1913 to care for and preserve President Jefferson's home, Monticello, serving as its president from 1919 to 1925.

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