Things Noted Here and There

Mark M. Smith,"The Touch of an Uncommon Man," CHE, 22 February, and Susannah Tully,"A Sense of History," CHE, 22 February (links free to non-subscribers), exemplify and explore Mark's work on the history of the senses. It's more fully developed in his new book, Sensing the Past: Seeing, Hearing, Smelling, Tasting, and Touching in History. Previously, he's published Listening to Nineteenth-Century America (2001); and Hearing History: A Reader (2004).

Emory's Gary Laderman has launched Religion Dispatches, an online magazine seeking to bridge conversations between the public and the academic community on religious issues with articles by historians like Randall Balmer and Martin Marty. Currently, it features Michael Elliot's"Mark Twain's Blasphemy," 18 February, which revisits The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Michael Weiss's"The End of the Obama Honeymoon," Pajamas Media, 18 February, conveniently summarizes five lines of attack against Barack Obama, now that he is a (slight) front-runner for the Democratic Party's nomination: 1) plagiarism*, 2) his supporters' tribute to Che Guevara in Houston, 3) the consultation of his foreign policy advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski, with Syrian officials, 4) questions about his"pledge" to a publically financed campaign, and 5) questions about his commitment to troop withdrawal from Iraq. Hat tip to Glenn Reynolds.
*Jonah Goldberg, of all people, puts the plagiarism charge in perspective.
On the eve of contests in Hawaii, Washington, and Wisconsin, nonetheless, over 190 historians, including most recently Yale's David Brion Davis, have endorsed Obama's candidacy. Read more for their names:

Manan Ahmed, Cliopatria*
Leslie M. Alexander, Ohio State University
Shawn Leigh Alexander, University of Kansas
Catherine Allgor, University of California, Riverside
Laura Anker, SUNY, Old Westbury
Joyce Appleby, University of California, Los Angeles
Ray Arsenault, University of South Florida

Robert Baker, Georgia State University
Lewis V. Baldwin, Vanderbilt University
Christopher Bates, California State Polytechnic, Pomona
Rosalyn Baxandall, SUNY/Old Westbury
Robert L. Beisner, American University
Doron Ben-Atar, Fordham University
Jonathan P. Berkey, Davidson College
William C. Berman, University of Toronto
David Blight, Yale University
Ruth Bloch, University of California, Los Angeles
Daniel Bluestone, University of Virginia
Edward J. Blum, San Diego State University
Kevin Boyle, Ohio State University
John L. Brooke, Ohio State University
Carolyn A. Brown, Rutgers University
Mari Jo Buhle, Brown University
Paul Buhle, Brown University

Jodi Campbell, Texas Christian University
Randolph Campbell, University of North Texas
Gregg Cantrell, Texas Christian University
Charles Capper, Boston University
Clayborne Carson, Stanford University
John Chavez, Southern Methodist University
William Cohen, Hope College
Dennis Cordell, Southern Methodist University
Mary F. Corey, University of California, Los Angeles
George Cotkin, California Polytechnic Institute
Edward Countryman, Southern Methodist University
Daniel W. Crofts, The College of New Jersey

Robert Dallek, Boston University
Adam Davis, Denison University
Jared N. Day, Carnegie Mellon University
John d'Entremont, Randolph College
Dennis C. Dickerson, Vanderbilt University
Jacob H. Dorn, Wright State University
David Doyle, Jr., Southern Methodist University
David V. Du Fault, San Diego State University
W. Marvin Dulaney, College of Charleston

Gretchen Cassel Eick, Friends University
Carolyn Eisenberg, Hofstra University

J. Michael Farmer, University of Texas, Dallas
Michael Fellman, Simon Fraser University
Antonio Feros, University of Pennsylvania
Peter Filene, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Kenneth Fones-Wolf, University of West Virginia
William E. Forbath, University of Texas, Austin
Shannon Frystak, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania

Matthew Gabriele, Virginia Tech
Lloyd Gardner, Rutgers University
Sheldon Garon, Princeton University
David Gellman, DePauw University
James Gilbert, University of Maryland
Mark T. Gilderhus, Texas Christian University
Toni Gilpin, Chicago, Illinois
Rebecca A. Goetz, Rice University
David Goldfrank, Georgetown University
Warren Goldstein, University of Hartford
Linda Gordon, New York University
Anthony T. Grafton, Princeton University
Will Gravely, University of Denver
George N. Green, University of Texas, Arlington
James Green, University of Massachusetts, Boston
Sara M. Gregg, Iowa State University
Robert Griffith, American University
Michael Grossberg, Indiana University
James Grossman, Newberry Library
Carol S. Gruber, William Paterson University
Joshua Guild, Princeton University
Roland L. Guyotte, University of Minnesota, Morris

David Hall, Harvard University
Kenneth Hamilton, Southern Methodist University
J. William Harris, University of New Hampshire
Sam W. Haynes, University of Texas, Arlington
Nancy A. Hewitt, Rutgers University
Jonathan Holloway, Yale University
Jeffrey Houghtby, Iowa State University
Tera W. Hunter, Princeton University
Harold Hyman, Rice University

Maurice Jackson, Georgetown University
Thomas F. Jackson, University of North Carolina, Greensboro
Lisa Jacobson, University of California, Santa Barbara
Hasan Kwame Jeffries, Ohio State University
Randal Jelks, Calvin College
John Jentz, Marquette University
Benjamin H. Johnson, Southern Methodist University

David A. Johnson, Portland State University
Robert KC Johnson, Brooklyn College
Jennifer M. Jones, Rutgers University
Patrick D. Jones, University of Nebraska, Lincoln
Peniel E. Joseph, Brandeis University

Michael Kazin, Georgetown University
Ari Kelman, University of California, Davis
Stephen Kern, Ohio State University
Richard H. King, University of Nottingham
Sarah Knott, Indiana University
Gary Kornblith, Oberlin College

Carol Lasser, Oberlin College
Melinda Lawson, Union College
Steven Lawson, Rutgers University
Jackson Lears, Rutgers University
Alan Lessoff, Illinois State University
James M. Lindgren, SUNY, Plattsburgh
Edward T. Linenthal, Indiana University
William A. Link, University of Florida
James Livingston, Rutgers University
Paul K. Longmore, San Francisco State University
Ralph E. Luker, Cliopatria

J. Fred MacDonald, Northeastern Illinois University
Chandra Manning, Georgetown University
Norman Markowitz, Rutgers University
Jill Massino, Oberlin College
Kevin Mattson, Ohio University
Jaclyn Maxwell, Ohio University
Martha May, Western Connecticut State University
Timothy Patrick McCarthy, Harvard University
Joseph A. McCartin, Georgetown University
Robert S. McElvaine, Millsaps College
Marjorie McLellan, Wright State University
Sally G. McMillen, Davidson College
James McPherson, Princeton University
Edward D. Melillo, Oberlin College
Tony Michels, University of Wisconsin, Madison
Christopher Morris, University of Texas, Arlington
Walter Moss, Eastern Michigan University
Todd Moye, University of North Texas

Joan Neuberger, University of Texas, Austin
Michelle Nickerson, University of Texas, Dallas

David O'Brien, College of the Holy Cross
William L. O'Neill, Rutgers University

William A. Pencak, Pennsylvania State University
Claire Potter, Wesleyan University
Michael Punke, University of Montana

David Quigley, Boston College

Stephen G. Rabe, University of Texas, Dallas
Albert J. Raboteau, Princeton University
Monica A. Rankin, University of Texas, Dallas
Janice Reiff, University of California, Los Angeles
Steven G. Reinhardt, University of Texas, Arlington
Leo Ribuffo, George Washington University
Natalie J. Ring, University of Texas, Dallas
Jerry Rodnitzky, Texas Christian University
Ruth Rosen, University of California, Berkeley
Peter Rothstein, Juniata College
Edward B. Rugemer, Yale University

Douglas C. Sackman, University of Puget Sound
Leonard J. Sadosky, Iowa State University
Nick Salvatore, Cornell University
Brian Sandberg, Northern Illinois University
John Savage, Lehigh University
Martha Saxton, Amherst College
Ellen W. Schrecker, Yeshiva University
Rachel F. Seidman, Duke University
Brett L. Shadle, Virginia Tech
Rebecca Sharpless, Texas Christian University
James Sidbury, University of Texas at Austin
Daniel J. Singal, Hobart and William Smith Colleges
Manisha Sinha, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Harvard Sitkoff, University of New Hampshire
Gene Allen Smith, Texas Christian University
Daniel Soyer, Fordham University
Paul Spickard, University of California, Santa Barbara
Brian Steele, University of Alabama, Birmingham
James Brewer Stewart, Macalester College
Jeffrey Stewart, George Mason University
Mary Stroll, University of California, San Diego

David Thelen, Indiana University
Jeffrey Trask, New York University
Stephenie Ambrose Tubbs, Helena, Montana
Elizabeth Hayes Turner, University of North Texas
Bruce M. Tyler, University of Louisville

Kevin Uhalde, Ohio University

Siva Vaidhyanathan, University of Virginia
Kara Dixon Vuic, Bridgewater College

David J. Weber, Southern Methodist University
Barbara Weinstein, New York University
Richard Weiss, University of California, Los Angeles
Kathleen Wellman, Southern Methodist University
Daniel Wickberg, University of Texas, Dallas
Craig Steven Wilder, Dartmouth College
Margaret Williams, William Patterson University
R. Hal Williams, Southern Methodist University
David W. Wills, Amherst College
Charters Wynn, University of Texas, Austin

Susan Yohn, Hofstra University

Eli Zaretsky, New School for Social Research

*Institutional affiliations are listed for identification purposes only and, of course, do not indicate an institutional endorsement.