What Would Ben Franklin Do?

What would Ben Franklin do? July has turned out to be an exciting and stressful month.

I am traveling a lot: I visited Bermuda at the start of the month and I just came home from the SHEAR conference in Raleigh, North Carolina. Next week, I am off to Podcast Movement, the national podcasting conference, in Fort Worth, Texas.

On the home front, I am working a LOT.

Ben Franklin's World: A Podcast About Early American History continues to do well, it just surpassed 225,000 downloads. It has also started to grow in ways that I hadn't anticipated. I must create plans to handle this growth. (I promise to explain once my plans are in place.)

I am also trying to find time to work on my book. Yes, I am still working on turning my dissertation into a book and I really want to finish it so I can start my next research project.

With all of this going on, I need to find more time. Which brings me to my new mantra: What would Ben Franklin do?

I am confident that Ben would cut all non-essentials from his schedule and focus on finding an apprentice and funding for his publication.

Therefore, I will not be posting "Book of the Week" or roundup posts until I can figure out how to outsource more podcast work. I have a couple of plans to find/attract funding. I promise to share these ideas soon.

Additionally, my posting on this blog will likely be a bit more sporadic over the next few months, or perhaps not. I have several posts in my draft queue. They cover topics such as 18-Second History: How Historians Can Use Clammr to Spread History & Promote Their Work; Podcast Workflow; Crowdsource Funding Your Digital History Project; How to Tweet a Conference Panel; To Conference or Not to Conference; and Tick-Tock the Academic Publishing Clock.

Thank you for your understanding and support.

Announced: History Communication Twitter Chat No. 2

Jason Steinhauer released details about the second History Communication or #histcomm twitter chat.

When: Friday, July 24, at 1pm EST Duration: 30 - 40 minutes Hashtag to Follow: #HistComm

Questions for Chat

1. How has history communication evolved to meet the needs of today’s digital audience?

2. On which networks (Facebook, Twitter) are you most likely to seek out history info? Least likely?

3. Which history accounts do you follow that deliver excellent social content?

4. What historical subjects do the history accounts you follow cover? Which do they omit?

5. Which non-historical accounts are doing great work on social media? How can historians learn from them?

6. What is a history project you’re working on/excited about?

Book of the Week: Frontier Seaport

[simpleazon-image align="right" asin="022609670X" locale="us" height="500" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41iaUdUbjWL.jpg" width="333"]This week's read is Catherine Cangany's [simpleazon-link asin="022609670X" locale="us"]Frontier Seaport: [/simpleazon-link] (University of Chicago Press, 2014).

Description from Amazon.com

Detroit’s industrial health has long been crucial to the American economy. Today’s troubles notwithstanding, Detroit has experienced multiple periods of prosperity, particularly in the second half of the eighteenth century, when the city was the center of the thriving fur trade. Its proximity to the West as well as its access to the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River positioned this new metropolis at the intersection of the fur-rich frontier and the Atlantic trade routes.

In Frontier Seaport, Catherine Cangany details this seldom-discussed chapter of Detroit’s history. She argues that by the time of the American Revolution, Detroit functioned much like a coastal town as a result of the prosperous fur trade, serving as a critical link in a commercial chain that stretched all the way to Russia and China—thus opening Detroit’s shores for eastern merchants and other transplants. This influx of newcomers brought its own transatlantic networks and fed residents’ desires for popular culture and manufactured merchandise. Detroit began to be both a frontier town and seaport city—a mixed identity, Cangany argues, that hindered it from becoming a thoroughly “American” metropolis.

Journalists, Platforms, & Historians

You know you've made it as an academic blogger when a senior scholar reads one of your blog posts and expands upon it on their blog. This happened to me last week, when "Historiann" Ann M. Little read "How to Write for Your Readers" and offered a follow-up post.

Ann points out that in addition to writing a good story, journalists have the benefit of platforms and publisher advances that they can use to hire researchers.

So this is the part of the story that I think is missing from Zuckoff’s advice about writing a bestseller:  First of all, the journalists-turned-bestsellers that I know of are writers who already have a prominent platform and a name brand.  This is why a lot of U.S. Americans think Cokie Roberts is a more authoritative source for information on early American women’s history and the history of American First Ladies than Catherine Allgor or Mary Beth Norton, two professional historians who have published with trade presses and know how to tell a story.

Additionally, Ann questions whether historians should attempt to compete with journalists when they write their books.

Should professional historians try to compete on this playing field?  (Do we even want to?  I’m sure some of you will have different answers to this question.)  I’m all for writing books that people want to read.  Although I give away a metric tonne of free writing on this blog, I strongly believe that if we want to publish physical books and ask people to buy them, we need to think about the quality of our writing and tell a good story.  Covart and Zuckoff are absolutely right about that.

I am all for writing the best books possible, but like Ann, I wouldn't want to hire out my research. I enjoy researching. I also like that I can control the material I see and consider.

You should check out Ann's post. She provides great insight into academic publishing and she offers a sneak peak at her forthcoming book The Many Captivities of Esther Wheelwright (Yale, 2016).

Click here to read Ann's post

L'Hermione & the Marquis de Lafayette

On Saturday, July 11, 2015, I had the opportunity to visit aboard L'Hermione, an exact replica of the 18th-century ship that brought the Marquis de Lafayette back to the United States in 1780. Lafayette and L'Hermione played important roles in the United States' quest for independence.

I had an opportunity to interview Miles Young, President of the Friends of Hermione organization, for Ben Franklin's World. Miles discussed Lafayette, the role the French Navy played in the American War for Independence, and how the project to rebuild L'Hermione came about. It was a fascinating interview.

Click here for "Lafayette & the Hermione."

Being onboard L'Hermione was a cool experience. The opportunity also afforded me the chance to investigate Miles' claim that I could "smell" the ship.

Miles was right. You can small the pitch, tar, and wood used to build L'Hermione.