The Exchange

The Oxford Journals Doctoral Colloquium in Business History will be held in conjunction with the BHC annual meeting . This prestigious workshop, sponsored by the BHC and funded by the Journals Division of Oxford University Press, will take place in Columbus, Ohio, at the conference site on Wednesday, March 20 and Thursday, March 21. The colloquium is limited to ten students. Participants work intensively with a distinguished group of BHC-affiliated scholars that includes at least two BHC officers. The colloquium will discuss dissertation proposals, relevant literatures and research strategies, and employment opportunities in business history. This colloquium is intended for doctoral candidates in the early stages of their dissertation projects.      If you are interested in being considered for this colloquium, please submit to Roger Horowitz ( BHC2013@Hagley.org) by December 1, 2012,   a statement of interest, a CV, a preliminary or final dissertation prospectus...

The journal Business History has issued a call for papers for a special issue on "Theoretical and Empirical Research on Business Longevity." Guest editors will be Maria Rosaria Napolitano (University of Sannio, Italy), Vittoria Marino (University of Salerno, Italy), and Jari Ojala (University of Jyväskylä, Finland). The call for papers explains:     The special issue, with a targeted publication date of April 2014, is aimed at investigating firms’ longevity factors. The importance of longevity has been highlighted in earlier studies on family business by focusing on their difficulties in enduring through the third generation. Hence the strong focus in the literature, on the one hand, on business succession in family enterprises, and, on the other, on the identification of enduring firms’ distinctive features. In order to fill both a theoretical and an empirical gap, several contributions have attempted to model the values of longevity and their role in the entrepreneu...

The program for "Translating Potential into Profits: Foreign Multinationals in Emerging Markets since the 19th Century," a workshop to be held at the German Historical Institute in Washington, D.C. (1607 New Hampshire Ave. NW), on November 2-3, 2012, is now available. The convenors are Matthias Kipping (Schulich School of Business, Toronto) and Christina Lubinski (GHI). According to the call for papers, "The purpose of this workshop is to provide historical perspectives on the operations of multinationals in emerging markets, which present significant opportunities but also a range of serious challenges for foreign investors. The intention is to provide some general insights about how these multinationals managed to adapt to these conditions and establish a successful and lasting presence in these markets." The international list of speakers includes scholars from the Netherlands, the UK, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Chile, Argentina, and Japan, in addition...

Readers in the Washington, D.C., area may wish to check out a workshop being held by the World Bank later this week. On October 25-26 , the Bank will host a meeting on "Using History to Inform Development Policy: The Role of Archives." Among the many speakers are business historians Michele Alacevich, William H. Becker, Stephanie Decker, Alexander Field, and Gianni Toniolo. As the organizers explain, the "Using History to Inform Development Policy" workshop will bring together World Bank staff, outside scholars whose research has benefited from the opening of archives of the World Bank and other international agencies, and the development community. Through a combination of case studies and thematic papers participants will explore how history strengthens the effectiveness of development work and discuss the benefits of using methodological tools from different social sciences—a mixture of narrative techniques and economic analysis. . . . The workshop is also ...

The Museum of Early Trades & Crafts (METC) is seeking proposals for articles to include in the formal exhibit catalog for the exhibit,"Ghosts, Ghouls and Gravestones: The Trades of Burial" set to run September 2013 through February 2014. All articles should relate in some way to the theme of the exhibit and the state of New Jersey.     According to the Museum's exhibit abstract: starting during the colonial period the final phase of life helped to support numerous tradesmen in the American colonies, later states. Among the several trades involved were gravediggers, coffin-makers, and gravestone carvers. Few tradesmen could survive solely by working these trades, unless they resided in heavily populated areas during prosperous times, but they honed their skills while producing similar products. While they may not have plied their trades full-time these men helped their communities to mourn their dead and continue with life. Those interested in contributing to ...

"Global Commodities: The Material Culture of Early Modern Connections, 1400-1800" is a conference to be held at the University of Warwick on December 12-14, 2012, sponsored by the Global History and Culture Centre . The conference website now contains information about registration, accommodations, and funding, as well as the preliminary program . According to the organizers, This conference seeks to explore how our understanding of early modern global connections changes if we consider the role material culture played in shaping such connections. In what ways did material objects participate in the development of the multiple processes often referred to as ‘globalisation’? How did objects contribute to the construction of such notions as hybridism and cosmopolitanism? What was their role in trade and migration, gifts and diplomacy, encounters and conflict? What kind of geographies did they create in the early modern world? What was their cultural value vis-à-vis...

This summer, the Hagley Museum and Library created a channel on Historypin to organize and spotlight areas of its collection. Readers can find a description of the process here in the Hagley Library and Archives News. Historypin is a user-generated global archive of photographs taken in the past and present; many historical museums, archives, and societies have begun to use the site to make available coherent "stories" from their collections. For example, using the "tour" feature, Hagley materials are organized into "Making Black Powder in the DuPont Company Yards" ; for other Hagley photographic tours on Historypin, see here .     The Hagley channel on Historypin was developed by Della Hall of the University of Delaware.     Among the many other organizations with Historypin channels are the US National Archives and the Smithsonian Institution Archives .

As part of this year's Business History Forum at Columbia University , Naomi Lamoreaux of Yale University will present a talk entitled " 'Corporations Are People Too': The Strange History of Corporations and the Fourteenth Amendment." This session will take place on November 7, 2012, in 107 Warren Hall (115th Street & Amsterdam Avenue). The abstract for the talk states: In 1886 the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Morrison R. Waite, declared at the start of oral arguments in the case of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad, “The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does.” This simple statement has generally been taken to be the Court’s definitive position on the legal personhood of corporat...

The Yale Program in Economic History will sponsor a mini-conference on New Perspectives on Ottoman Economic History to be held at Yale University on November 9-10, 2012. The co-organizers of the conference are Professor Timothy Guinnane, Yale University, Economic Growth Center, and Seven Agir, Middle East Technical University. The program has now been posted, along with registration information. The conference is open to the public, but registration is required to assist in planning. All papers will be available on the conference website approximately three weeks before the meeting. Authors will not present their paper; instead, they will have ten minutes to summarize their results. Rather than have a formal discussant, discussion will be opened immediately to all participants [Interested readers might also like to visit a web resource, "Economic History of the Ottoman Empire," developed by Metin Cosgel at the University of Connecticut.] 

Several historians of business history in Canada have set up a Google group, " Canadian Business Historians/historiens des affaires canadiens ," in order to coordinate activities among Canadian scholars in the field. They also plan a website and a series of scholarly activities.     The first of these will be the Canadian Business History Workshops, which will feature presentation and discussion of two draft papers (circulated in advance). It is hoped that these will become regular meetings as part of an attempt to build a closer network among business historians in Canada. The inaugural workshop will be held at the Brantford Campus of Wilfrid Laurier University, 73 George Street, Brantford, Ontario N3T 2Y3 on Friday, November 16, 2012. (For a map, please see: http://tinyurl.com/8kmgjtj ). The Workshop will start at noon in the Carnegie Building, Lower Level, Room 100, with lunch, provided by the Dean's office. The schedule is: 12:00-1:30 pm    Lunch 1....

A reminder that the application deadline for the Harvard-Newcomen Postdoctoral Fellowship in Business History is October 15, 2012 . The Felllowship is awarded for twelve months' residence, study, and research at Harvard Business School. The fellowship is open to scholars who, within the last ten years, have received a Ph.D. in history, economics, or a related discipline. The fellowship has two purposes: The first is to enable scholars to engage in research that will benefit from the resources of Harvard Business School and the larger Boston scholarly community. A travel fund and a book fund will be provided.     The second purpose is to provide an opportunity for the fellow to participate in the activities of Harvard Business School. The fellow is required to research and write a case, under the direction of a senior faculty member, to be used in one of the business history courses. Finally, the fellow is encouraged to submit an article to Business History Review during h...

The European Association for Banking and Financial History (EABH) e.V, in cooperation with Deutsche Bank AG, will hold a Workshop on "Archival Legislation for Finance (ALFF) in Europe," on November 23, 2012. The Workshop will take place at Deutsches Bank in Frankfurt am Main. It is the first in a series of workshops on the legal requirements for archiving financial information (data retention) in European nations. The full program has now been posted, as well as details about registration, travel, and accommodations. Please visit the Workshop website for complete information.

On November 10, 2012, the Leeds Centre for Victorian Studies will host a one-day colloquium titled "Muck and Brass: Money and Finance in Victorian Britain." Co-convened by Dr. Rosemary Mitchell (Leeds Trinity University College) and Dr. Donna Loftus (Open University), the event is designed "to encourage cross-disciplinary dialogue between literary scholars and social, economic, and cultural historians and to showcase interdisciplinary research into the economic and financial cultures of Victorian Britain." The keynote speakers will be Professor Ranald Michie (University of Durham) and Professor Janette Rutterford (Open University). The preliminary program is now available.    Those wishing to attend must register by October 29 , using the form attached to the program document. Please see the colloquium website for complete information.

The Summer 2012 issue of the Marquette Law Review features a symposium on the Interstate Commerce Act and the commission it created: "125 Years Since the Interstate Commerce Act: A Symposium in the Form of a Final Convocation." The articles are freely available for download as a set and individually . The table of contents: Joseph D. Kearney, "Foreword: The Last Assembly of Interstate Commerce Act Lawyers" James W. Ely, Jr., "The Troubled Beginning of the Interstate Commerce Act" Randal C. Picker, "The Interstate Commerce Act and the Sherman Act: Playing Railroad Tycoon" Thomas W. Merrill, "The Interstate Commerce Act, Administered Contracts, and the Illusion of Comprehensive Regulation" Paul Stephen Dempsey, "The Rise and Fall of the Interstate Commerce Commission: The Tortuous Path from Regulation to Deregulation of America's Infrastructure" Richard D. Cudahy, "The Interstate Commerce Act as a Mode...