Tom Isern, NDSU

I want to draw attention to the article by my colleague Dave Danbom published in North Dakota History 70 (2003): 2-19. The title is, "'He Was a Man, Worthy of Respect': Gender, Matrimony, and Moral Entitlement in Fargo, North Dakota, during the Great Depression." Students, such as my Senior Seminar students--have a look at this piece. (I've got an extra copy, ask me for it.) Notice the introduction beginning in medias res. Notice how the intro homes in on a thesis three paragraphs in. Take a look at the notes, and you'll see a generous mix of primary materials. The newspaper material is great, but notice particularly that the meat of the work comes from manuscript sources, stuff that came out of boxes, not books. Finally, note the discursive note 2, which indicates connections with extant secondary literature. This piece is like a primer for apprentice historians.

At lower right of my NDSU home page is a link to "Kiwi Dreams," weblog of Lorna Meidinger. Lorna is a History major from NDSU who is studying at Waikato University, Hamilton, New Zealand.

HIST 790 Grassroots History (see link at left) is now open for business. For persons desiring graduate work in Great Plains history, I now have 6 credit hours continuously available--HIST 730 and HIST 790. 730 is a reading seminar. 790 is a research seminar. It's particularly good for someone who wishes to write for presentation or publication. Students in 790 are to produce research papers grounded in local primary sources.