History Faculty Books

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  American Evangelists and Tuberculosis in Modern Japan

  Elisheva Perelman

  Tuberculosis ran rampant in Japan during the late Meiji and Taisho years (1880s–1920s). Many of the victims of the then incurable disease were young female workers from the rural areas, who were trying to support their families by working in the new textile factories. The Japanese government of the time, however, seemed unprepared to tackle the epidemic. Elisheva A. Perelman argues that pragmatism and utilitarianism dominated the thinking of the administration, which saw little point in providing health services to a group of politically insignificant patients.

  This created a space for American evangelical organizations to offer their services. Perelman sees the relationship between the Japanese government and the evangelists as one of moral entrepreneurship on both sides. All the parties involved were trying to occupy the moral high ground. In the end, an uneasy but mutually beneficial arrangement was reached: the government accepted the evangelists’ assistance in providing relief to some tuberculosis patients, and the evangelists gained an opportunity to spread Christianity further in the country. Nonetheless, the patients remained a marginalized group as they possessed little agency over how they were treated.

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  Keeping Oregon Green: Livability, Stewardship, and the Challenges of Growth, 1960-1980

  Derek R. Larson

  Keeping Oregon Green is a new history of the signature accomplishments of Oregon’s environmental era: the revitalization of the polluted Willamette River, the Beach Bill that preserved public access to the entire coastline, the Bottle Bill that set the national standard for reducing roadside litter, and the nation’s first comprehensive land use zoning law. To these case studies is added the largely forgotten tale of what would have been Oregon’s second National Park, intended to preserve the Oregon Dunes as one of the country’s first National Seashores.

  Through the detailed study of the historical, political, and cultural contexts of these environmental conflicts, Derek Larson uncovers new dimensions in familiar stories linked to the concepts of “livability” and environmental stewardship. Connecting events in Oregon to the national environmental awakening of the 1960s and 1970s, the innovative policies that carried Oregon to a position of national leadership are shown to be products of place and culture as much as politics. While political leaders such as Tom McCall and Bob Straub played critical roles in framing new laws, the advocacy of ordinary citizens—farmers, students, ranchers, business leaders, and factory workers—drove a movement that crossed partisan, geographic, and class lines to make Oregon the nation’s environmental showcase of the 1970s.

  Drawing on extensive archival research and source materials, ranging from poetry to congressional hearings, Larson’s compelling study is firmly rooted in the cultural, economic, and political history of the Pacific Northwest. Essential reading for students of environmental history and Oregon politics, Keeping Oregon Green argues that the state’s environmental legacy is not just the product of visionary leadership, but rather a complex confluence of events, trends, and personalities that could only have happened when and where it did.

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  Challenging Women since 1913: The College of Saint Benedict

  Annette Atkins

  A history of the first one hundred years of the College of Saint Benedict, Saint Joseph, Minnesota, published in celebration of its centennial.

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  Survival Schools: The American Indian Movement and Community Education in the Twin Cities

  Julie L. Davis

  In the late 1960s, Indian families in Minneapolis and St. Paul were under siege. Clyde Bellecourt remembers, “We were losing our children during this time; juvenile courts were sweeping our children up, and they were fostering them out, and sometimes whole families were being broken up.” In 1972, motivated by prejudice in the child welfare system and hostility in the public schools, American Indian Movement (AIM) organizers and local Native parents came together to start their own community school. For Pat Bellanger, it was about cultural survival. Though established in a moment of crisis, the school fulfilled a goal that she had worked toward for years: to create an educational system that would enable Native children “never to forget who they were.”

  While AIM is best known for its national protests and political demands, the survival schools foreground the movement’s local and regional engagement with issues of language, culture, spirituality, and identity. In telling of the evolution and impact of the Heart of the Earth school in Minneapolis and the Red School House in St. Paul, Julie L. Davis explains how the survival schools emerged out of AIM’s local activism in education, child welfare, and juvenile justice and its efforts to achieve self-determination over urban Indian institutions. The schools provided informal, supportive, culturally relevant learning environments for students who had struggled in the public schools. Survival school classes, for example, were often conducted with students and instructors seated together in a circle, which signified the concept of mutual human respect. Davis reveals how the survival schools contributed to the global movement for Indigenous decolonization as they helped Indian youth and their families to reclaim their cultural identities and build a distinctive Native community.

  The story of these schools, unfolding here through the voices of activists, teachers, parents, and students, is also an in-depth history of AIM’s founding and early community organizing in the Twin Cities—and evidence of its long-term effect on Indian people’s lives.

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  The State We're In: Reflections on Minnesota History

  Annette Atkins and Deborah L. Miller

  On the occasion of Minnesota's 150th anniversary of statehood, over a hundred historians and other writers assembled to discuss the subjects they had been studying, thinking, and writing about. This book presents the best of that work.

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  And One Fine Morning: Memories of My Father

  Nicholas Hayes

  Read about the author's father, Mark Hayes, at the height of his career in the mid-1950s as one of Minnesota's most successful modernist architects. His is also the story of the "Minnesota Irish" who emigrated from Ireland during the Great Hunger.

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  The Very Nature of God: Baroque Catholicism and Religious Reform in Bourbon Mexico City

  Brian R. Larkin

  The changing practices and meanings of Catholicism in Bourbon Mexico are the subject of this study, based on research in the last wills and testaments of the faithful of Mexico City as well as contemporary devotional literature and ecclesiastical documentation. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, baroque Catholicism, with its exuberant ornamentation of sacred space and lavish rituals, dominated both ecclesiastical and lay religious practice in New Spain. During the second half of the eighteenth century, a group of reforming bishops attempted to remake religious culture, to move the faithful away from baroque Catholicism to a simpler, and in their minds, more interior piety. The reform movement distanced God from the physical world as reformers sought to redefine the balance in Catholic religious practice to emphasize pious contemplation over ritual action.

  Larkin examines baroque Catholicism, the project to reform religious culture in Mexico, and the new pious practices that reformers and the faithful negotiated as the colonial period moved toward a close. He argues that baroque and reformed Catholicism rested on different understandings of the very nature of God. Baroque Catholicism privileged a corporeal conception of God; whereas reformed piety promoted a more spiritual one. Religious reform, he argues, coincided with secular reforming projects, all of which participated in and influenced new forms of epistemology and subjectivity that established the conditions for the contested beginnings of the modern era in eighteenth-century Mexico.

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  Creating Minnesota : A History from the Inside Out

  Annette Atkins

  Historian Annette Atkins Presents a fresh understanding of how a complex and modern Minnesota came into being in Creating Minnesota. Each chapter of this innovative state history focuses on a telling detail, a revealing incident, or a meaningful issue that illuminates a larger event, social trends, or politics during a period in our past." "A three-act play about Minnesota's statehood vividly depicts the competing interests of Natives, traders, and politicians who lived in the same territory but moved in different worlds. Oranges are the focal point of a chapter about railroads and transportation: how did a St. Paul family manage to celebrate their 1898 Christinas with fruit that grew no closer than 1,500 miles from their home? A photo essay brings to life communities of the 1920s, seen through the lenses of local and itinerant photographers. The much-sought state fish helps to explain the new Minnesota, where pan-fried walleye and walleye quesadillas coexist on the same north woods menu." "In Creating Minnesota, Atkins invites readers to experience the texture of people's lives through the decades, offering a fascinating and unparalleled approach to the history of our state."

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  The Work of the Heart: Young Women and Emotion, 1780-1830

  Martha Tomhave Blauvelt

  How did young American women construct and express their emotions between 1780 and 1830? Before Oprah and therapy, how did they reconcile society’s demanding and often contradictory expectations? In The Work of the Heart: Young Women and Emotion, 1780-1830, Martha Tomhave Blauvelt looks to the often spirited diaries written by young women in America’s early republic, arguing that the continuous, demanding, and often unnoticed emotional labor of women exemplified their uneasy position within society.
  
  Employing the concept of "emotion work," Blauvelt argues that despite the fact that the amount of physical labor may have declined for these young women, the popularity of fiction, desire to display genteel refinement, need to deflect criticism of women’s academy education, and resignation in marriage created multiple emotional tasks requiring highly skilled labor. In her detailed examination of fifty young northern women’s diaries during this time period, the author shows that while this work entailed attempts at suppressing inappropriate feeling, it also invited self-consciousness and a sense of competence as these women addressed society’s often contradictory expectations. In a variety of settings, emotion work was the means through which women constructed a fluid and negotiated self, while their diaries provided a mirror and tool of this labor.
  
  Showing work where none seemed to exist, The Work of the Heart suggests emotion work as a key measure of women’s status, whether for the twenty-first century or the eighteenth, and offers an analytical tool for historians exploring the self.

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  We Grew Up Together : Brothers and Sisters in Nineteenth-century America

  Annette Atkins

  "While much attention has been devoted to connections in American families between husbands and wives and between parents and children, We Grew Up Together speaks to an area that has been largely neglected until now: the emotional relationships among siblings." "Through close readings of the letters brothers and sisters wrote to each other over the course of nearly a century (1840-1920), Annette Atkins reveals the inner workings, everyday lives, and central relationships of ten nineteenth-century families. She looks at families located in various regions, families headed to the frontier, obscure families, and prominent families such as the Blairs of Washington, D.C. Drawing on the insights of Alfred Adler and others, Atkins examines the varying dynamics of "warm" and "cool" families and shows how siblings tutored each other in friendship, authority, cooperation and competition, dependence and independence."--BOOK JACKET.

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  When I First Began My Life Anew : Middle-Class Widows in Nineteenth-Century Britain

  Cynthia Curran

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  With Hearts Expanded: Transformations in the Lives of Benedictine Women, St. Joseph, Minnesota, 1957 to 2000

  Evin Rademacher OSB, Emmanuel Renner OSB, Olivia Forster OSB, and Carol Berg OSB

  In With Lamps Burning, Sister Grace McDonald traced the growth of Saint Benedict’s Monastery from its establishment in Minnesota in 1857 to its centennial in 1957. It is the purpose of this sequel to capture the exciting and often troublesome challenges that faced this community in the last half of the twentieth century. It is a story of moving from a stable and predictable era to an explosive era of expanded knowledge, information, and communications that resulted in irreversible societal changes effected by such grassroots movements as civil rights, women’s rights, and environmental concerns, and by a Christian religious transformation called for by Vatican Council II. The story of the community’s struggles and achievements in responding to the call to renew itself and set its face toward the third millennium needs to be told: most people, observing only the external manifestations of the changes, were not privy to the sacredness of the transformations taking place. This book offers the community’s self-disclosure in the hope that it will help its readers find meaning for the challenges with which God also shapes their lives. [from the Introduction]

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  On the Social Origins of Medieval Institutions : Essays in Honor of Joseph F. O'Callaghan

  Theresa Vann and Donald J. Kagay

  A collection of essays celebrating the career of Joseph F. O'Callaghan, a noted historian of Spanish history. Written by his students and colleagues, they explore the relationship between human society and the institutions it produces.
  The first part of the book, The Influence of Law on Society, contains essays exploring the laws and customs regarding such social institutions as marriage, the care of the sick, and Jews. The second part, The Relationship between Government and War, focuses on the institutional and technological innovations that the crown and parliament in Spain and England developed to wage war.

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  The Loaf That Became a Legend: A History of Saint John's Bread

  Kenneth M. Jones and Diane Veale Jones

  The aroma, the flavor, the memories -- Saint John's Bread has delighted students, alumni and visitors of the Saint John's community for generations. Based on a robust Old World recipe, the bread has been a staple in the diets of the Benedictine monks since they established their community in Collegeville. This is a history of how that crusty loaf became a favorite of a much larger community.

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  Queens, Regents, and Potentates

  Theresa Vann

  This series focuses on the exercise of power, influence and authority by particular categories, ranks and types of women in medieval societies, and by individual women; on the limitations, restrictions and inhibitions placed or assumed on such activity; on the opportunities open to women, and on the strategems by which women were able to give effect to these possibilities. Queens, Regents and Potentatesconcentrates on the theme of women and royal power, examining the available information about specific royal women and reassessing their access to and use of power and authority, and drawing significant new conclusions about internal politics and international relations in medieval Europe

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  Lafayette, Hero of Two Worlds : The Art and Pageantry of His Farewell Tour of America, 1824-1825 : Essays

  Stanley J. Idzerda, Anne C. Loveland, and Marc H. Miller

  Produced to accompany an exhibition commemorating General Gilbert du Motier Lafayette's triumphal visit to America nearly 50 years after the outbreak of the American Revolution--in which his participation proved indispensable--this felicitous mesh of history and art presents such curiosities as a coach that carried Lafayette from Albany to Buffalo and a breast pin con taining locks of Lafayette's and George Washington's hair. Idzerda (co-editor of Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution ) contributes a biographical essay. Loveland ( Emblem of Liberty: The Image of Lafayette in the American Mind ) captures the reactions of the populace to this hero of two revolutions and defines the manner in which his visit acted as ``a crucial impetus to American nationalism.'' Miller, curator of the Queens (N.Y.) Museum, distinguishes the styles of portraits and busts of the period, examines Lafayette's influence on the restoration of Revolutionary War sites and traces the shapes of monuments to their classical origins.

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  Midwest USA/China Resource Guide

  P. Richard Bohr

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  Harvest of Grief : Grasshopper Plagues and Public Assistance in Minnesota, 1873-78

  Annette Atkins

  Atkins eloquently portrays the extreme hardships of Minnesota farmers during the grasshopper plagues of the 1870s. She examines local, state, and national relief efforts, which she reviews in the context of nineteenth-century social welfare philosophy.

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  Philip Mazzei : Selected Writings and Correspondence

  Stanley J. Idzerda, Filippo Mazzei, Marghertia Marchione, and S. Eugene Scalia

  Vol. 1. 1765-1788 : Virginia's agent during the American Revolution --
  v. 2. 1788-1791 : Agent for the King of Poland during the French Revolution --
  v. 3. 1792-1816 : World citizen.

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  Christianity in the People's Republic of China : Reflections from a Recent Visit

  P. Richard Bohr

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  Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution : Selected Letters and Papers, 1776-1790

  Stanley J. Idzerda and Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier Lafayette marquis de

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  Bicentennial Convocations at Sage Chapel

  Stanley J. Idzerda, Robert Neelly Bellah, and Milton R. Konvitz

  "Three sermons on the nation's bicentennial delivered at Sage Chapel, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York."

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  France and the American War for Independence

  Stanley J. Idzerda and Roger Everett Smith

  Discusses the moral, financial, and military support of the American Revolution by France which, after being ejected from North America in 1763, became an ally of the new nation.

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  Famine in China and the Missionary: Timothy Richard as Relief Administrator and Advocate of National Reform, 1876-1884

  P. Richard Bohr

  “The most disastrous famine in recent Chinese history took place between 1876 and 1879, afflicting all five provinces of North China [Shantung, Chihli, Honan, Shensi, and Shansi] and claiming no fewer than nine and a half million human lives [….] The hunger, pestilence, and violence brought about by the famine presented an overwhelming challenge to government and foreign relief efforts [.…] Despite these obstacles, however, Timothy Richard of the Baptist Missionary Society succeeded in organizing an effective, systematic scheme of relief distribution in several districts of Shantung and Shansi. His work on the scene in turn stimulated the foreign community to organize the China Famine Relief Fund Committee, and his method of rendering aid set the pattern of foreign almsgiving which did much to ease the suffering of thousands [….]
  
  “This study analyzes Richard’s role in the North China famine and evaluates his contribution to the relief effort. It concentrates on Richard’s initial distribution attempts in Shantung, 1876-1877, and his more extensive activities in Shansi, 1877-1879. By comparing Richard’s relief measures with those of the Ch’ing government as well as with those of the foreign distributors supported by the China Famine Relief Fund Committee, the study attempts to describe the various approaches to the problem of famine relief and to illuminate the many difficulties encountered by Chinese and foreigners in the relief work.
  
  “However, it is not only Richard’s relief program that must be considered. The impact of the famine on the subsequent course of Richard’s missionary career forms an important part of the whole famine story. For Richard emerged from the calamity convinced that he must urge China’s leaders to eradicate the basic causes of famine and similar natural disasters and to elevate the physical as well as the spiritual welfare of the rural masses. In the years during and immediately following the Great Famine, Richard evolved the basis of a broad scheme of national reform which aimed at China’s modernization for the purpose of rooting out the poverty and misery of Chinese life. The study will assess the early reform proposals which Richard put forth between 1876 and 1884, the year he returned to England on furlough. The groundwork of his reform ideas will be examined along with his actual attempts to promote national reform and economic developments, from his first conversations with Chinese officials to his decision to appeal to the Chinese literati at large through the Chinese-language press.”
  
  --from the Introduction.

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  The Historical Thought of Frederic Ozanam

  Emmanuel Renner OSB