History Club and Phi Alpha Theta Help Cub Scouts with Citizenship Merit Badge

By Abigail Mercadante

This semester the members of the History Club and Phi Alpha Theta (the Honor Society for History majors) teamed up with Dr. Jeff Long to help a local Boy Scout troop earn their badge in citizenship. During this event the Scouts were taught what it meant to be a good citizen. They were divided into two groups and participated in various activities. One group was taught the proper way to salute and put their creative skills into action as they drew a picture of what the Pledge of Allegiance meant to them. The responses that they came up with, such as protecting our country from the “bad guys” and respecting our nation, represented what it meant to be a good citizen. Another group participated in discussions where they were asked what they thought it meant to be a good citizen and they all agreed that things such as helping the elderly and not breaking the law were at the top of their list. The Scouts were also taught about the rights and responsibilities we have as citizens and were all disappointed they were not able to vote the following day!

Other News From Around the History Department

Dr. Douglas Karsner and Dr. Jeff Long have established a relationship with Temple University which will allow Bloomsburg University students to study abroad in Japan during the summer and transfer their earned credits back to BU. This opportunity allows BU students to take a wider range of East Asian courses as well as experience a different culture.

Dr. Karsner has recently published an article titled, "The Real Bottom Line: A History of Business Executives Move for Vietnam Peace," for Essays in Economic and Business History Society.  In 2014, The Economic and Business History Society awarded Dr. Karsner The Editor's Award for 2013 which "recognizes contributors of multiple articles to Essays in Economic & Business History whose work over several years gave scholarly definition to the journal."

Last spring Dr. Long presented a paper titled, “The Sakka Dōmei’s ‘Greatest Enemy’: Politics, Literature, and Snark in the Criticism of Hayashi Fusao’s ‘Seinen’” at the Bundan Snark: Writing and Fighting in Modern Japan Workshop Conference.  The workshop was held at the University of Iowa on May 10, 2014.

Through the Institute for Culture and Society in the College of Liberal Arts, Dr. Michael Hickey has been working with students on a project for the Magee Foundation to digitize archival documents that have been recovered from the 2011 flood. This project is done by student volunteers and is completely student centered.

Last month Dr. Walter Howard delivered the annual Monsignor Curran Lecture at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, PA. The lecture was titled “Socialist and Communist Labor Organizers in the Anthracite Coal Fields in the 1930s." Dr. Howard has authored several books on this subject.

In 2012, Dr. Hickey received a Fulbright Senior Scholar Award to teach at Smolensk State University (Smolensk, Russia). Recently Dr. Hickey has two essays that will be published:  "Jews in the Revolution," in Daniel Orlovsky, ed., The Oxford Companion to the Russian Revolution and "Smolensk's Jews in War, Revolution, and Civil War," in Aaron Retish, et. al. eds., A Kaleidoscope of Revolutions:  Russia in Regional Perspective (Bloomington:  Slavica, 2015).

In spring 2014, Dr. Nancy Gentile-Ford published an article online for the International Encyclopedia of the First World War titled “Civilian and Military Power (USA)”. During the summer Princeton University hosted the “Patriots or Invaders? - Immigrants in the Military in Modern America” Conference and Dr. Ford presented on “Immigrants in the Military: Regional and Historical Factors.”

Dr. Jeanette Keith’s 2012 book on a yellow fever outbreak in nineteenth-century Memphis titled Fever Season: The Story of a Terrifying Epidemic and the People Who Saved a City is receiving excellent reviews not only from historians but from the medical community as well.