Carl Parrini (February 22, 1933 - December 13, 2016) was an American historian. For many years he taught at Northern Illinois University. He was a specialist in US diplomatic history. Born in Rochester, New York, he attended the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee before transferring to and graduating from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He continued there as a graduate student, where he studied closely with Fred Harvey Harrington, Howard K. Beale, and Merrill Jensen. William A. Williams directed his doctoral dissertation, a study of U.S. economic diplomacy during the Woodrow Wilson and Warren G. Harding administrations that Parrini completed in 1963. He was in an academic cohort at Madison, influenced by Williams, that included Walter LaFeber, Lloyd C. Gardner, Thomas J. McCormick, Dav