1952 Born to New York Dorothy and Paul Cohen in Paramus, New Jersey

1968 AFS exchange student in Japan

1969 Graduates from high school in Scarsdale, New York

1969 Enters Princeton in the first class that includes women

1970 Gets to know her future husband, Herrick Chapman, during the student protest against the US bombing of Cambodia

1972 Works on Shirley Chisholm’s campaign for president of the United States

1973 Graduates from Princeton magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, with certification to teach secondary-level history and English

1973–1975 Teaches and works in Massachusetts

1975–1978 Works in museums in California

1977 Marries Herrick Chapman, a historian of modern France

1986 Earns PhD in history at UC Berkeley

1986–1992 Teaches as assistant professor of history at Carnegie Mellon University

1986 Daughter Julia Cohen Chapman is born

1989 Daughter Natalie Cohen Chapman is born

1991 Wins Bancroft Prize for Making a New Deal: Industrial Workers in Chicago, 1919–1939, published in 1990

1992–1997 Works as associate professor of history with tenure and, later, professor of history with tenure at New York University

1997 Begins her post as professor of history with tenure at Harvard University

1999 Named the Howard Mumford Jones Professor of American Studies at Harvard University

2001–2002 Spends year as a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute

2003 Publishes A Consumers’ Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America

2008–2010 Serves as chair of Harvard’s Department of History

2011–2012 Serves as interim dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study

Photo by Tony RinaldoMarch 2012 Appointed dean of the Radcliffe Institute