Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography
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The Reluctant President: Gaylord P. Harnwell and American University Leadership after World War II
No full textThis article examines the University of Pennsylvania’s presidential search of 1952–53, which led to the election of the physicist Gaylord P. Harnwell, in light of other universities’ presidential searches and literature on such searches during that era. It reveals the existence of a competitiv e market for university leaders characterized by three common themes: how universities prioritized keeping their own rising stars; the growing power of the faculty in university governance, which translated to pressure to hire an academic as university president; and how professors who directed military-oriented research during World War II parlayed that experience into postwar administrative careers
Pennsylvania\u27s Past from a Unique Perspective: Oral History
No full textAn oral history project as part of a course on the history of Pennsylvania offers students an opportunity to connect to the history of their communities, make tangible the topics that we study in class, and provide documentation of a person, place, event, or community that might otherwise be lost. To be successful, students need to learn how to research their topic, work with recording equipment, conduct a pre-interview, structure an interview, ask open and closed questions, and transcribe an interview. While a challenging and time-consuming assignment, the oral history project is often the aspect of the course that students find most rewarding, as it offers them an opportunity to record a family member’s story, to learn about an aspect of local history, or to make a contribution to the history of a neighborhood or organization. Reviewing my students’ work is also one of my favorite aspects of the course; it gives me added insight into the lives of the people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the recent history of the state. Supplemental resources are posted on the journals’ web pages
Front Matter
No full textThis is the front matter for Volume 139, No. 2 of the Pennsylvania Magazine History and Biography
Book Review: Law and Medicine in Revolutionary America: Dissecting the "Rush v. Cobbett" Trial, 1799 by Linda Myrsiades
No full textIn 1797, Benjamin Rush sued William Cobbett for libel. Rush’s decision to address in the courtroom the biting criticism “Porcupine” had leveled at “Sangrado” during the 1797 yellow fever epidemic was a highly risky strategy that ultimately proved a pyrrhic victory for the doctor. In 1798, the Alien and Sedition Acts made it possible for Rush’s Republican legal team to turn the tables on the Federalists by using their law to punish one of their own journalists. Linda Myrsiades “anatomizes” the Rush-Cobbett trial of 1799 as a case study that captures the interrelationship among early party politics, the medical marketplace, debates over freedom of the press, and an emerging uniquely American jurisprudence (3). By contextualizing a rare, published trial transcript, Myrsiades offers a highly compelling reading of Rush v. Cobbett as a “crucible for testing critical issues of the times” that explores the mutually constituting narratives of medicine and politics, fever and religion, individual and nation
Sharing Swedenborg\u27s "Sweets in Secret": The United Free-Will Baptist Church, ca. 1810-23
Full text linkON THE EVENING OF OCTOBER 28, 1912, about thirty thousand spectators lined Orthodox Street and Frankford Avenue to watch an illuminated procession of trade vehicles and fl oats demonstrating modern machinery, evidence of Frankford’s role in making Philadelphia “the workshop of the world.” The celebration concluded a week later with a parade highlighting Frankford’s history. Representatives of the neighborhood’s civic organizations and churches, arranged by founding date, followed the historical tableaux. The New Jerusalem Church of Frankford (Swedenborgian), one of Frankford’s oldest congregations, chose to walk last to signify its “new era” of community service. The church had recently spearheaded the creation of an ecumenical social service cooperative designed to promote understanding among diverse community groups and provide healthy, engaging activities for neighborhood youth. Members of the New Jerusalem Sunday School, carrying an azure silk banner emblazoned with the church name and founding date, were greeted with hearty applause along the parade route.
Coordination or Competition: State Regulation of Motor Buses under Private Ownership and the Decline of Mass Transit in Pittsburgh
Full text linkIn 1973, Allegheny County’s public transit agency, the Port Authority, declared bus driver Leonard Bruno “Driver of the Year.” A decade earlier, Bruno was not a government employee, but an entrepreneur who drove and maintained his own bus in a one-man operation,Carnegie Coach Lines. However, like all transit frms in Pennsylvania, his company was not free from government oversight. Te route he drove, the fares he charged, and other aspects of Bruno’s business were regulated bythe state Public Utility Commission.Te commission relinquished regulatory control when the Port Authority bought Carnegie Coach Lines and thirty-two other privately owned transit companies in Allegheny County in 1964 and 1965
Book Reviews
Full text linkFrom Peace to Freedom: Quaker Rhetoric and the Birth of American Antislavery, 1657–1761; The Cost of Liberty: The Life of John Dickinson; To Live an Antislavery Life: Personal Politics and the Antebellum Black Middle Class; On the Edge of Freedom: the Fugitive Slave Issue in South Central Pennsylvania,1820–1870; The Philadelphia Nativist Riots: Irish Kensington Erupts; Making Freedom: The Underground Railroad and the Politics of Slavery; Mira Lloyd Dock and the Progressive Era Conservation Movement; Seeking the Greatest Good: The Conservation Legacy of Gifford Pinchot; Black Citymakers: How “The Philadelphia Negro” Changed Urban America; The Nicest Kids in Town: “American Bandstand,” Rock ’n’ Roll, and the Struggle for Civil Rights in 1950s Philadelphi
Roadside America and the Engine(s) of Progress
Full text linkAlong the rolling, bucolic stretch of I-78 between Allentown and Harrisburg, billboards entice travelers to exit at Shartlesville for “Roadside America: The World’s Greatest Indoor Miniature Village.” A local institution since 1953, this attraction features remarkably detailed, handcrafted, miniature scenes of American history, industry, and progress, arranged in a sweeping, eight-thousand-square-foot tabletop tableau. The life’s work of creator Laurence T. Gieringer, Roadside America, with its emphasis on models of regional landmarks and locales, serves as a multifaceted material-culture “text” through which to explore key relationships between energy sources and Pennsylvania’s lived history
Index
No full textThis is the Index for Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 139, No. 3, October 201