Leonard Dinnerstein, a historian whose doctoral dissertation on the 1915 lynching of Leo Frank, a Jewish factory manager in Atlanta, heralded his career as one of the nation’s foremost scholars of anti-Semitism, died Jan. 22 at his home in Tucson. He was 84. Professor Dinnerstein’s theses was published in 1968 by Columbia University Press, titled simply, The Leo Frank Case. It has never been out of print.

He received his doctorate in American history from Columbia University. He first taught at the New York Institute of Technology and at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey before moving to the University of Arizona, where he was a professor of history from 1970 through 2004, and director of Judaic Studies from 1993 through 2000. In addition to his published thesis, he is the author of three books on immigration, ethnic groups, and the Holocaust.