History

For more than a century, historians have identified the Battle of Falkirk (1298) as a turning point in infantry tactics, not only for the Scots but also for warfare in the Western World. In his seminal work on military history, Hans Delbrück (1848-1929) wrote that Falkirk was unique, concluding “nowhere else in the Middle Ages do we find such great masses of foot soldiers who do not immediately break ranks when attacked by knights.” Delbrück was referring to the spearmen organized by Scottish Guardian William Wallace (d. 1305) in a battle that he lost against English King Edward I (r. 1272-1307). Delbrück is not alone in his assertion that Falkirk initiated, or at least preceded some revolutionary method for using foot soldiers, as the claim persists in numerous modern works. Remarkably, there was nothing new about the Scots’ tactics, but Falkirk remains popular in modern memory, predominately due to high profile participants such as Wallace and Edward, the former a national hero, as well as a dense library of contemporary and modern histories. In an attempt to neatly categorize transitions and trends in warfare, historians have erroneously identified Falkirk as the beginning of an era where infantry alone won battles, or at least stood up to cavalry, but in reality such infantry-centric achievements were occurring more than a century prior in the Western World.

Two new books argue that the Founding Father and physician helped shape the new nation. Reviews of Stephen Fried, Rush: Revolution, Madness, and Benjamin Rush, the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father (Crown, 2018) and Harlow Giles Unger, Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation (Da Capo, 2018).

From 1917 to 1921 Ranger, Texas and the area surrounding it experienced the discovery of oil and the dramatic changes that accompanied such a discovery. 
Starting at a population of 800, the town peaked at about 40,000 with the surrounding area peaking at approximately 100,000 people.  The changes that were taking place during the critical years of 1917 through 1921 were enough to overwhelm any community.  With little infrastructure in place, the oil industry, laborers, and community found many obstacles to overcome in order to create a functional system for the extraction of the oil and the habitation of the thousands of new citizens.  Using biographies and memoirs to establish the basic circumstances of life during the boom years, this paper will then use public records and contemporary documents to show how this community built the infrastructure to handle a stable population of over 16,000 in just four years through tax levies and bond issues, support of the oil and rail industries, and community involvement.

The Jacobites were those who for numerous reasons supported the Stuart and claim to the throne of England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland. They had backing of France for many of the rebellions and from Spain. France and Spain supported the Jacobites for their own reasons, more political than most of the Jacobites. There were many reasons for people to join the Jacobites. Over the course of the rebellions many people joined the movement when they had a problem with England. This rebellion was not short and was not constantly going on. The Jacobite movement lasted close to one hundred years. There were not continuous riots and battles going on for all of those years. Even though the movement had died no heir to the Stuart throne ever gave up their families’ claim to the throne, which means even to this day there is an heir to the Stuart throne. Instead the heirs stopped trying to regain the throne. This is what ended the rebellions.

Cicero is often thought of as an idealist and the last great defender of the Republic. Although he was probably sincere in the love of his country, this paper looks at how Cicero was not idealistic in his politics and was much more realistic in how he handled situations.

view at:  http://joyshasteen.wix.com/historic-districts

Little research reaches home buyers about living in historic neighborhoods.  This project, a website, is an informational tool useful to preservationists, realtors and home buyers.  The ultimate public history experience is to have the public live the history; nothing does this quite like living in a historical home.
Note website correction: 

http://joyshasteen.wix.com/historic-districts

How an avowed marxist, the son of the most famous industrialist in the United States, and a museologist who already held one of the most prestigious positions in the art world, came together to produce the most famous set of frescoes in Detroit, in the midst of the Great Depression and in a city that epitomized both the good and the bad of the American 20th century industrial era.

How humans historically preceived the technology they have and how this perception influenced the direction of both the technology and history has been little studied by historians.  In the mid-19th through the early 20th century, the American house became a "system."  Utility companies looking for customers to pay for infrastructure brought both electricity and gas out the industrial areas of towns and onto transportation lines for use of streetcars and public lighting.  The next logical step was to bring it to the home, changing American cultural life. This paper presents how this use of energy and particularly how electrification was received and perceived by the American homeowner and homemaker, turning the American house into a complex industrial dwelling where an individual could spend leisure time as well as a place to live.

"It never rose, it never fell, but rumbled to the high ceiling in might monotone.  It was the voice of the Street, now hopeful now tragic, making audible the history of a momentous day in the market...As it faded, a singular cacophony welled from the floor where more than 12,000,000 shares had changed hands and where paper fortune had vanished.  It was a mixture of groans, of boos, and of sighs of relief.  The final chorus had an eerie quality, like chords from a primitive requiem."
New Your times, Friday, October 25, 1929
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Economists have differed in whether or not the Federal Reserve functioned well enough to prevent bank panics after it was formed but it is undeniable it was unable to stop the Great Depression and its impact on the Great Recession is till unknown.  Did the Federal Reserve do everything it could to stabilize the American economy in the last 100 years?  Did it function as Wilson (together with Congress) had proposed?  did the Federal Reserve cause the Great Depression, the Great Recession and other smaller recession in the 100 years since it was formed?  All these views have been expressed by economists through the 100 years of the Federal Reserve.  This essay looks at each of these views together with the actual historical actions taken by the Reserve and attempts to discover why, although designed to stop or mitigate panics and recessions, the Federal Reserve was unable to stop the largest and most damaging "recession" in US history---the Great Depression. The second theme of this paper addressed in terms of history versus monetary policy follows the way  the Reserve addressed monetary issues in the last 100 years versus fiscal issues of monetary flow; the paper looks not so much at what the dollar did but what the federal bank did in the course of its history as a federal regulatory agency.