Clyde Norman Wilson (born 11 June 1941) is an American professor of history at the University of South Carolina, a paleoconservative political commentator, a long-time contributing editor for Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture and Southern Partisan magazine, and an occasional contributor to National Review. Wilson is best known for his expertise on the life and writings of John C. Calhoun, having recently compiled all his papers in twenty-eight volumes. He has been the M.E. Bradford Distinguished Chair of the Abbeville Institute, an adjunct faculty member of the libertarian Ludwig von Mises Institute, and an affiliated scholar of the League of the South Institute, the research arm of the League of the South. In 1994 Wilson was an original founder of the League of the South.
Clyde Norman Wilson was born on June 11, 1941 in Greensboro, North Carolina, where he was raised. His father, Clyde Sr., a fireman, was a leader in the state Firefighters Union and was chosen to train and command the first African-American fire company in Greensboro. Clyde Jr. was editor of the Greensboro High School newspaper in his senior year, receiving a special commendation from the Columbia University Scholastic Press Association for editorial writing. During that year, 1958–1959, the high school was the first in North Carolina to be integrated.
Wilson received the B.A. at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1963 and the M.A. in 1964. While still a student he published journalism in the Greensboro Daily News, the Greensboro Record, the Winston-Salem Journal, and the Chapel Hill Weekly, and wrote a regular column for the campus Daily Tar Heel. From 1964 he spent several years as a reporter for the Richmond News Leader and the Charlotte News, covering police, courts, and other matters.