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Over the Counter: Issue no. 6

A recent NPR "Morning Edition" feature focused on "The Forgotten Female Programmers Who Created Modern Tech" (audio and text). The program mentions particularly Ada Lovelace and Grace Hopper, as well as the resources of the Computer History Museum.

The New York Times published two more essays on Edward Baptist's "The Half Has Never Been Told": "Harvesting Cotton-Field Capitalism: Edward Baptist’s New Book Follows the Money on Slavery" and a review by Eric Foner.

Still on Baptist, there is an analytical post by Patrick Rael on the African American Intellectual History Society blog: "Capitalism's Slavery"; and Tom Cuttenham over at The Junto continues the discussion with "Commodifying Labour, Commodifying People."

Sad to report the death of well-known French business historian Maurice Lévy-Leboyer, on September 27; Hubert Bonin has published a homage.

Some time ago, we reported on the efforts of business historians to save the Wedgwood Collection, which was in danger of being sold off. Such efforts have been successful, as it has been announced that sufficient funds have been raised to save the collection.

The National History Center and the German Historical Institute hosted a program on C-Span, on "The History of Immigrant Entrepreneurship." Speakers include Hartmut Berghoff, Zulema Valdez, and Xiaojian Zhao.

The Journal of American History (2014), no. 2: 503-536, has an interchange on "The History of Capitalism."  Participants include Sven Beckert, Angus Burgin, Peter Hudson, Louis Hyman, Naomi Lamoreaux, Scott Marler, Stephen Mihm, Julia Ott, Philip Scranton, and Elizabeth Tandy Shermer. The full text is gated, but is available to OAH members or through institutional subscription.

Resource: The Consumer Movement Archives at the Kansas State University Libraries.

Fascinating resource for food historians (and economic historians looking for price data), created by reference librarian Lynne Olver: The Food Timeline; see particularly the "Historic Food Prices FAQ."

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