Louise L StevensonEmerita Professor of History and American Studies
Biography
For many years, I taught at Franklin & Marshall College as a professor of history and American Studies. I chaired the history department and the women's studies program. In 1993, President Clinton appointed me to the Board of Trustees of the James Madison Memorial Fellowship Foundation, and I served for 8 years.
My published writing focuses on nineteenth-century cultural and intellectual life, and almost every piece situates its subject in a transatlantic context. In 2015, Cambridge University Press published Lincoln in the Atlantic World. I look forward to publishing its sequel, Lincoln and Freedom on the High Seas, in the forthcoming year.
Other books on these subjects include Scholarly Means to Evangelical Ends: The New Haven Scholars and the Transformation of Higher Learning in America, 1830-1890 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986), and The Victorian Homefront: American Cultural and Intellectual Life, 1860-1880 (1991, new ed., Cornell University Press, 2001). Recent work includes articles on books and reading in everyday life, from the best sellers of the eighteenth century through the blockbusters of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. A recent piece, "The Global Meaning of the Gettysburg Address," appears in Gettysburg Replies: The World Responds to Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, an anthology containing articles from world leaders, film stars, civil rights leaders, and several historians.
Almost every summer, I supervised students pursuing independent research and presentations. In 2013, students prepared an exhibit "Emancipation 150: National Event and Local Lives" to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Proclamation. Students also investigated the army on-campus training program during World War I and spies in World War II. In a recent year, seniors investigated a family's involvement in World War I from Belgian Relief through the Paris Peace Conference. Other students investigated the memory of the Kosovo intervention, Cold War crises of the 1950s, the art of Andy Warhol, the battle of Gettysburg, women's involvement in early radio broadcasting, the effect of the women's movement on American high school textbooks, Ms. magazine and the evolution of feminism, Lancaster reading clubs, and the invention of the concept "brain dead."
For the history and American Studies departments, I taught courses and advanced seminars focused on the Civil War, Lincoln, and U.S. Empire. Inspired by the musical Hamilton, I introduced a course, Hamilton and History. Some students from my seminars had their papers selected by undergraduate online journals. For example, an article by Emily Hawk '16 entitled An Anomalous Case of Southern Sympathy: New Jersey's Civil War Stance was published in the Gettysburg College Journal of the Civil War Era.
In the summer months, I often supervised students in the Hackman fellowship program. We worked on my own research or an archives project. During the coronavirus lockdown, a student investigated the visit of the Prince of Wales to the United States in 1860.
In 2015 and 2016, we focused on diaries of WWI soldiers who were F&M students. These projects appear here:
World War I and Franklin & Marshall Graduates:
By Hackman Fellow Danielle Cicchiello, a web presentation featuring the 111th Ambulance Corps (WWI Battlefield Medicine) and a biography of its commander, Dr. Charles P. Stahr (F&M 1897), son of F&M president John Stahr (1889-1909). The 111th Ambulance Corps was recruited from the men of F&M and Lancaster County and a memorial to its men stands in Buchanan Park. Dr. Charles Stahr Biography
F&M graduates' diaries and profiles:
Franklin and Marshall College Alumni in World War I
Student researchers and I found and preserved previously unarchived sources, for example collections of the history of Lancaster Women's Liberation, the Lancaster Humane League, the Lancaster County League of Women Voters, and the Lancaster Junior League. We also have mounted an exhibition of World War I posters in the student gallery of the Phillips art museum, and recently we have recovered the history of a Southern family's involvement in the Great War.
A proud Buffalonian, who loves winter sports, especially skiing, I attended Vassar College for two years before earning a B.A. degree cum laude and with honors in American Studies from Barnard College. After completing the M.A. degree at New York University, I earned a Ph.D. degree in American Studies from Boston University. Here in Lancaster, I am involved in the community. Currently, I am on the board of the Lancaster Medical Heritage Foundation and work as an editor of the Journal of the Lancaster County Historical Society. I served on the board of directors of the Lancaster County League of Women Voters for 22 years.
Employment
Professor, 1996-2023; Associate Professor, 1989-96; Assistant Professor, 1982-89, Departments of History and American Studies, Franklin & Marshall College.
Chair, Department of History, 1991-94.
Chair, Women's Studies, 1995-2001.
Visiting Lecturer, Department of History, University of New Hampshire, Durham, 1981-82.
Summer Seminar Leader, American Antiquarian Society, June, 2002: "Books in American Lives." Taught seminar (20 classroom hours) consisting of graduate students, college and university professors, historical society professional and university librarians.
Recent Scholarly Work (See PUBLICATIONS below for a complete list)
Lincoln in the Atlantic World. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
"The Global Meaning of the Gettysburg Address," in Gettysburg Replies: The World Responds to Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address (2015).
"Ophelia Settle Egypt: Rediscovering Social Science in the Harlem Renaissance," Journal of Southern History (August 2011).
Education
Ph.D. American and New England Studies, Boston University.
M.A. History, New York University.
B.A. American Studies, cum laude & with honors, Barnard College.
Grants & Awards
For 2000-01. Mellon Fellow at Library Company of Philadelphia, Peterson Fellow at American Awards Antiquarian Society, Wintherthur Fellow, Spencer Grant for Research on Early American Women's Intellectual History.
For 1994. Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship, Library Company of Philadelphia for one month of research.
1994. Spencer Foundation Grant for study of the Educational Dimension of American Women's Everyday Intellectual Lives.
1992. Bradley R. Dewey Award for Scholarship and Teaching, Franklin & Marshall College.
1989. Spencer Foundation Grant for study of education in everyday Victorian life.
1988. H. F. DuPont Scholar, Winterthur Museum and Gardens. For study of material culture and Victorian intellectual life.
1989. Franklin & Marshall College Grant Award for Victorian Agenda.
1986-87. Franklin & Marshall College Grant Award for research on nineteenth-century student life at New York University.
1984-86. Franklin & Marshall College Grant Award for publication of Scholarly Means.
1976-77. Teaching Fellowships in English and History Departments, Boston University.
1975. Open Enrollment Teachers' Training Project, Boston University.
1974-75. Boston University Graduate Fellowship.
Publications
Books
Lincoln in the Atlantic World. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
The Victorian Homefront: American Thought and Culture, 1860-1880. New ed. with a new intro., Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2001.
The Victorian Homefront: American Thought and Culture, 1860-1880. New York: Twayne, MacMillan, 1991.
Scholarly Means to Evangelical Ends: The New Haven Scholars and the Transformation of Higher Learning in America, 1830-1890. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986.
Miss Porter's School: A History in Documents. 2 vols. New York: Garland, 1987.
Louise L. Stevenson, ed. Women's History: Selected Reading Lists and Course Outlines from American Colleges and Universities. 4th ed. New York: Markus Wiener, 1998.
Articles & Review Articles
"The New Woman, Social Science, and the Harlem Renaissance: Ophelia Settle Egypt as Black Professional," Journal of Southern History 77 (August 2011).
"Virtue Displayed: The Tie-Ins of Uncle Tom's Cabin," in Virtue Displayed: The Tie-Ins of Uncle Tom's Cabin.
"Homes, Books, and Reading," in The Industrial Book, 1840-1880., ed. Scott Casper et al. Vol. 3 of History of the Book in America (2007).
"The TransAtlantic Travels of James Thomson's The Seasons and its Baggage of Material Culture," Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, 116 (2006), 121-65.
"Charles Hodge, Manly Ministers, and Womanly Women," in Charles Hodge Revisited: A Critical Appraisal of His Life and Work, edited by John Stewart and James Moorhead. Grand Rapids, MI, Eerdman's, 2002. 159-80.
"Women," in American Cultural and Intellectual History, edited by Mary Kupiec Cayton and Peter W. Williams (New York: Scribners, 2001), 423-30.
"Home," in Encyclopedia of the United States in the Nineteenth Century, edited by Paul Finkelman. New York: Scribner's, 2000. 29-32.
"Colleges & Universities," in A Companion to America Thought. Boston: Basil Blackwell, 1995. "Little Women? The Female Mind at Work in Antebellum America," History Today, 45 (March 1995), 26-31.
"Reading Circles," in The Oxford Companion to Women's Writing in the United States (1995), 746-49.
"Women's Intellectual History: A New Direction," Newsletter of the Intellectual History Group, 15 (April 1993): 32-8.
"Prescription and Reality: Reading Advisers and Reading Practice, 1860-1880," Book Research Quarterly (Winter 1990-91), 43-61.
"It's Come to America: The History of the Book," Reviews in American History 18 (1990), 337-342.
"Preparing for Public Life: The Collegiate Students at New York University, 1832-1881," in The University and the City from Medieval Origins to the Present, 150-77. Ed. Thomas Bender. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.
Review of Women's Activism and Social Change: Rochester, New York, 1822-1872 by Nancy A. Hewitt, Reviews in American History 13 (1985), 70-75.
"Historians of Intellectuals: Out of the Trenches and into the Eighties," a review of Intellectual Life in America: A History by Lewis Perry. Newsletter of the Intellectual History Group, 7 (April 1985), 8-13.
"Between Old-Time College and Modern University: Noah Porter and the New Haven Scholars," History of Higher Education Annual 3 (1983), 39-58.
"Sarah Porter Educates Useful Ladies, 1847-1900," Winterthur Portfolio 18, no. 1 (1983), 39-59.
"A Conservative Critique of Victorian Culture: The New Haven Set, 1840-1890," Continuity 1 (1980), 61-74.
"Women Anti-Suffragists in the 1915 Massachusetts Campaign," New England Quarterly 52 (1979), 80-93.
Reviews for Academe, American Studies, Annals of the American Political and Social Science Assoc., Book Research Journal, History of Education Quarterly, Journal of American History, Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Journal of the Early Republic, Journal of Southern History, Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, New England Quarterly, Register of the Tennessee Historical Society, Science, William and Mary Quarterly, and Winterthur Portfolio.
Presentations
For the Lincoln book, I have appeared on Smart Talk, at WITF, for the Abraham Lincoln Association in Springfield, IL, at the National Civil War Museum, and at Lancaster County Historical Society, Constitution Day of the Donegal D.A.R., the Lancaster Fortnightly Club, and the Philadelphia Club, Vassar College.
Presented papers, chaired panels, or commented at annual meetings of the American Historical Association (1993, 1999), Organization of American Historians (1998, 1989, 1986, 1979), Mid-Atlantic Women's Studies Association (1988), American Studies Association (1983, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1995, 2000), American Society of Church History (1983), Duquesne History Forum, Pittsburgh, Pa. (1983), History of Education Society (1982, 1992, 1998, 2001), Berkshire Conference (1976, 1996).
Community and public service lectures and presentations presented at Celebration of Women's History, University of New Hampshire (1982); Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, N.H. (1983); Historical Society of York County, York, Pa. (1985); Temple Beth El, Lancaster (1986); Winterthur Museum and Gardens (1989), Willow Valley Retirement Community (2002), Lancaster Quest for Learning (2003-04), Lititz Public Library (2005), Boston University American Studies Alumnae/i (2006), Franklin & Marshall College Alumni Assoc. (2008, 2016).
Professional & College Activities
Ongoing: over the years I have reviewed manuscripts and/or proposals for American Quarterly, Civil War History, Cornell Univ. Press, Eerdman's, History of Education Quarterly, Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Journal of American History, National Endowment for the Humanities, Northern Illinois Univ. Press, Univ. of Kentucky Press, Pennsylvania Humanities Commission, Univ. of Kentucky Press, Univ. of Massachusetts Press, Penn St. University Press, Univ. Press of New England, Univ. of Pittsburgh Press, Journal of Women's History, and Oxford Univ. Press.
Current: Member, Lincoln Prize Advisory Council of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.
Past Member, Board of Overseers, Program on the History of the Book, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, MA.
1994-7 Member of the Editorial Board, History of Education Quarterly.
1991-96. Advisory Committee on the History of the Book, American Antiquarian Society.
1990-91. Planning Committee, "Icononography of Reading and the Book Project," American Antiquarian Society.
1988-89. Member, Merle Curti Award Committee of the Organization of American Historians.
1985-1991. Member, Editorial Board of the Newsletter of the Intellectual History Group.
1984-present. Secretary-Treasurer, Mid-Atlantic Chapter, American Studies Association.
Member of Organization of American Historians, American Studies Association.
COLLEGE COMMITTEES
College 1983-84 Academic Status Committee
College Senator 1985-86 President of College Senate. Presided over the Senate and served on agenda committee for faculty meetings.
1987-89 College Writing Committee and ad hoc committee to design a women's studies minor.
1990-91 Ad hoc Committee on faculty teaching load.
1992-93 College Grants Committee, Judicial Committee, Ad hoc Committee on Teaching Evaluation. Ad hoc Committee on Interdisciplinary Studies. Member of the Pew Roundtable.
1993-95, College Long Range Planning Committee
1992-95, Chair of History
1995-01, Chair of Women's Studies Program
1993-95, College Long Range Planning Committee
1998-2002, Trustee Committee on College Art Collections, Ad Hoc Committee on College Museum.
2004-07, Chair, College Committee on Athletics and Recreation
2006-10, Member, Ad Hoc Committee on College Houses.
2008-09. Library Committee, Chair.
2011-12. Committee on Grants, Chair.
2013-2014. Marshall Prize Selection Committee.
2013-16. Admissions Committee, Chair 2015-2016.
2018-20. Committee on Scholarships, Fellowships, and Grants.
College Service
Exhibition in the College Art Gallery, “Bicentennial Exhibit,” and booklet “Life on College Hill,” with historical essays by fourteen students of American Studies Seminar, 1986-1987.
“Coeducation Transforms the College,” an introduction to An Institution Re-founded: Coeducation at Franklin & Marshall College (2009).
“Introduction,” Sally Foreman Griffith, Liberalizing the Mind: Two Centuries of Liberal Education at Franklin & Marshall College. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2010.
Contributions to Archives and Special Collections
Supervision of Hackman Summer Scholars who processed the collections for deposit in the College Archives or at the Lancaster Country Historical Society
- Lancaster Country League of Women Voters
- Lancaster Humane League
- Lancaster Women’s Liberation
- World War I and World War II poster collection
- Lancaster Junior League
Emancipation 150, an exhibit in the Phillips Art Gallery and web exhibit on Omeka, 2013, by Hackman summer scholars Heather Brown and Megan Brown.
Co-chair, Franklin & Marshall and Legacy of Slavery Study Group and lead historian for its report, 2021-23.
College Awards
Dewey Prize, 1992
Alice Drum Women’s Center Award
“Phoenix Award,” Brooks College House, 2015
Lantern Award, Bonchek College House