This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: NYT
Jul 28, 2007
As an undergraduate at Harvard, Richard Lyman Bushman was offered some friendly advice by a favorite professor: he was a fine student, but his Mormonism was seen by the Harvard establishment as a “bunch of garbage.”
Mr. Bushman would do himself a favor, the professor told him, to leave the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints behind as a relic of his upbringing.
“I reacted just the opposite,” Professor Bushman said in a phone interview. “I said, ‘You’re not going
Source: Canberra Times
Jul 28, 2007
Stan Maizey remembers the day in 1967 when Australian forces in Vietnam decided to build a controversial minefield around their base in Phuoc Tuy.
His troops stretched thin on the ground, First Australian Taskforce commander Brigadier Stuart Graham deemed the minefield necessary to protect his soldiers.
Now Colonel Maizey and his fellow Vietnam veterans are fighting a rearguard action to protect their former commander's reputation after an explosive new history branded
Source: Lee White at the website of the National Coalition for History (NCH)
Jul 27, 2007
Last April, the Senate Judiciary Committee cleared a Freedom of Information reform bill (S. 849) (S. Rept. 110-59) by voice vote. The bill is similar to legislation (H.R. 1309) overwhelmingly passed by the House earlier this year by a vote of 308-117, with the bi-partisan support of 80 Republicans.
Unfortunately, since the bill passed the Judiciary Committee floor consideration has been stymied by a “hold” placed on the bill by Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) at the behest of the Bush admini
Source: Daily Show
Jul 26, 2007
Click on the SOURCE link to watch the video.
Source: Jean Edward Smith in a NYT op ed
Jul 26, 2007
[Jean Edward Smith is the author, most recently, of F.D.R.]
... When the court overreaches, the Constitution provides checks and balances. In 1805, after persistent political activity by Justice Samuel Chase, Congress responded with its power of impeachment. Chase was acquitted, but never again did he step across the line to mingle law and politics. After the Civil War, when a Republican Congress feared the court might tamper with Reconstruction in the South, it removed those questi
Source: NY Sun
Jul 26, 2007
James Maher, a writer and historian who exerted a vast influence on the field of music and cultural criticism, died July 18 at a Manhattan nursing home. He was 90.
Maher was best known for his contributions to Alec Wilder's "American Popular Song," a classic of musical scholarship, and for his prominence in the 2001 Ken Burns documentary "Jazz."
Maher began his career as a journalist in his native Cleveland, covering sports for the Plain Dealer in 19
Source: http://vietnamnews.vnagency.com.vn
Jul 26, 2007
Reported to be the first Vietnamese politician to set up a blog, well-known historian and deputy to the National Assembly Duong Trung Quoc says he did so to share his opinions with the country’s people.
Quoc, from the southern province of Dong Nai, was re-elected to the 12th NA last May. "What’s important is that the blog will be able to link me with voters and to everyone who is interested in the activities of NA deputies."
Quoc, the general director of the A
Source: Jamie Glazov at frontpagemag.com
Jul 26, 2007
Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Amity Shlaes, a visiting senior fellow in economic history at the Council on Foreign Relations and a syndicated columnist at Bloomberg. She has written for The Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal, where she was an editorial board member, as well as for The New Yorker, Fortune, National Review, The New Republic, and Foreign Affairs. She is the author of the new book The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression. The book is a national bestse
Source: Inside Higher Ed (Click on SOURCE for embedded links.)
Jul 26, 2007
The blog Progressive Historians pointed out this week that Historically Speaking, the publication of the Historical Society, is running an article by Robert Self about his new biography of Neville Chamberlain, wrapped around an ad for the book by its publisher, and that the author identification for Self (attached to the article, not the ad) included a discount for buying the book. “The ad placement was done as part of the editorial process, raising the question of editorial independence. With a
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education (CHE)
Jul 26, 2007
Simon Fraser University has settled a lawsuit with David Noble, an outspoken professor who said he had been denied a humanities appointment at the British Columbia institution because of his strong criticism of the use of technology in academe.
The settlement completes a saga that started six years ago, when a Simon Fraser search committee nominated Mr. Noble, a professor of history at York University, in Ontario, to hold its J.S. Woodsworth Chair in the Humanities. Administrators at Simon
Source: http://www.dailytidings.com
Jul 25, 2007
It is often said that when your work is what you love, it isn't work at all, but a passion. And anyone who knows George Kramer knows that he's passionate about history. People may not know his name, but the historic preservationist has been making his presence felt throughout Oregon for nearly two decades.
Some might feel inclined to ask what exactly a historic preservationist does, and they wouldn't be alone. Kramer himself describes his work as "a little bit of historian, arc
Source: Fred Kaplan at Slate.com in an article predicting the surge will fail
Jul 25, 2007
[HNN Editor: An essential part of the surge is the plan to lure Sunni tribesmen to the side of the US. Kapln argues that the tribesmen will probably be willing to make a temporary alliance only. Kaplan noted that after WW II the alliance between Stalin and the West crumbled once their common enemy had been defeated.]
... The idea of extending the alliances may have come, in part, from Stephen Biddle, a military historian and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, who,
Source: Press Release--IIE Scholar Rescue Fund Fellowships
Jul 25, 2007
The Institute of International Education's Scholar Rescue Fund (SRF) has
received special funding for the Iraq Scholar Rescue Project to provide
fellowships to scholars in Iraq whose lives and work are threatened.
The
Fund is currently seeking applications from suitable candidates and/or
candidate referrals.
*Academics, established researchers, and professors from Iraq in any
field
or discipline may qualify. Preference will be given to scholars with a
Ph.D.
Source: Mary Blume in the IHT
Jul 24, 2007
It's like a pilgrimage," says the historian Donald Sassoon, who spent two months looking at people looking at Mona Lisa and a year and a half writing a book about how she became the world's most famous painting.
A professor of Comparative European History at the University of London, Sassoon was born in Cairo and educated in Europe and the United States. He is in Paris to research a history of capitalism, has a book on Mussolini coming out in December and last year devoted 1,6
Source: ABC24 (Memphis)
Jul 24, 2007
The National Civil Rights Museum announced the 2007 Freedom Award recipients today, Tuesday, July 24, 2007.
Doctor John Hope Franklin, a former Professor of Legal History at Duke Law School, and Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the first female President of Liberia.
The Freedom Awards includes a new category this year, the Lifetime Achievement Award. Magic Johnson is the recipient of that award.
Past award recipients include Stevie Wonder, Maxine Smith, Bono, Bill Cl
Source: Inside Higher Ed (Click on SOURCE for embedded links.)
Jul 23, 2007
On Thursday, Waskar Ari went to the U.S. Embassy in La Paz, Bolivia and picked up his visa. Everything went smoothly, ending a two-year struggle by Ari and the University of Nebraska at Lincoln for him to join the university’s history department.
For most of the time, the Department of Homeland Security had a block on Ari obtaining a visa. Movement came only after the university took the unusual step of suing the federal agency this year and after numerous academic groups and facult
Source: AP
Jul 23, 2007
KAILUA, Hawaii — A University of New Mexico professor has drowned while trying to save his son at Kailua Beach.
He was identified by the Honolulu Medical Examiner's office as Timothy Moy, 44, of Albuquerque.
Authorities said he went into the water when his son got into trouble Sunday afternoon, but then started having trouble himself.
A young man with a bodyboard pulled Moy to the beach from about 100 yards offshore.
Rescuers attempt
Source: Mary L. Dudziak at her blog, Legal History
Jul 23, 2007
The Council of Graduate Schools has released a report on progress toward the PhD, across fields. Overall, 56.7% of those entering a U.S. doctoral program receive the PhD within 10 years. PhD completion rates within 10 years are highest in the sciences and mathematics. The tables are a bit hard to read, but in history the 10 year completion rate is 48%. In economics, the 10 year completion rate
Source: NY Post, Page Six
Jul 21, 2007
FAMILY SECRET July 21, 2007 -- A NEW biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt reveals a deep, dark secret the American railroad tycoon carried to his grave - he had an unquenchable thirst for hookers and succumbed to a debilitating sexual disease. In COMMODORE: THE LIFE OF CORNELIUS VANDERBILT, due in October from Basic Books, author Edward Renehan Jr. says the patriarch of the famed Vanderbilt dynasty suffered and died from an advanced case of syphilis in 1877. ‘He contracted it during a long career o
Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jul 21, 2007
Richard Long opens the door of his Inman Park home, and Edith Piaf's sad, birdlike voice wafts onto the porch. A slight but straight-backed man with searching blue eyes and professorial diction, he flashes a broad smile that reveals the warmth behind his aristocratic presence.
Though 80, the longtime Atlantan exudes the vitality of a much younger man, propelled by an unfailing curiosity that still takes him to distant continents and, twice yearly, to Piaf's Paris.
Long'
