Paul S. Boyer, 76, Dies; Historian Studied A-Bomb and Witches

Paul S. Boyer, an intellectual historian who wrote groundbreaking studies of the Salem witch trials, the history of apocalyptic movements and the response of the American public to the nuclear annihilation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, died on March 17 in Madison, Wis. He was 76.

The cause was cancer, said his wife, Ann.

Dr. Boyer, a professor of American history at the University of Wisconsin from 1980 until his retirement in 2002, was known for his research on the religious underpinnings of American culture, and especially for his interest in how Americans respond to perceived existential threats.

He first received wide notice in 1974 with “Salem Possessed: The Social Origins of Witchcraft,” which suggested that social envy motivated many of the accusers in the 17th-century witch trials....