Howard Zinn, historian and author of A People's History of the United States, has died of a heart attack. He was 87.

Zinn was born in New York and worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yards and served as a bombardier in World War II. He attended school on the GI bill, was active in the civil rights movement, and protested Vietnam.

On his last day at BU, Dr. Zinn ended class 30 minutes early so he could join a picket line and urged the 500 students attending his lecture to come along. A hundred did so.

A People's History should be required reading for every high school student in the nation. Zinn is survived by his daughter, his son, and five grandchildren.