MORE THAN YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT ME

I am a Professor of History, Emeritus ("Emeritus" is Latin for "Retired Old Guy") at Northeastern Illinois University, in Chicago, where I began teaching when Moses was a kid. From July 1, 2000, until June 30, 2005, I was Chair of the Department of History. On July 1, 2005, I was morphed into the Acting Dean of the Graduate College, and retired from the University effective January 1, 2006.

Before going over to the Dark Side of Academia (aka "administration"), I spent the first half of my career as a number-crunching social historian and semi-theorist. My most detailed work in this area is Religion in the City of Angels: American Protestant Culture and Urbanization, Los Angeles 1850-1930 (Ann Arbor:UMI Research Press 1979), which has been mercifully remaindered. My most frequently cited work from this quasi-sociological period is "Protestant Voluntary Associations and the Making of Victorian America," American Quarterly (December 1975). I presently define myself as an intellectual historian and semi-theologian, and am currently working on two quite different projects in American religious history. For summaries of these projects, follow this link



EDUCATION: Yeah. I've got some of that. Let's see. There's a piece of paper here just under one of the cats.. Oh yeah. Says I've got one of them Doctor of Philosophy things from the University of California at Los Angeles.
(You sports fans probably know it better as

but underneath the hoopla of athletics there is a great university in Westwood, in spite of the fact that they let me in).



This scrap of paper, a diploma I think it's called, is so old that I can't quite read the date. The picture above summarizes my memories of those idyllic days, so long ago, filled with intellectual excitement and social engagement, fueled by the energy of youth which is now a fading memory.

SIGH! Now, where was I?. . . .Oh, Now I remember.

You can find more detailed and boring stuff in the Curriculum Vitae. My activities in teaching and research are adequately summarized there. My selected publications and papers, however, do not include a record of some of the most exciting scholarly ventures I've encountered. That which easily comes to public attention is but a fraction of a scholar's effort, and I have included a sort of summary of my most frustating and fascinating research project.

Every once in a while somebody thinks I have something worth listening to, and I get to go to Springfield (what a treat!) and sound like a wise old guy before some committee. I've included a summary of my testimony before the Illinois State Senate Education Committee on Cult Activities on Campus. This took place in the Spring of 1994. Yeah, I know; that was a long time ago. I said "once in a while somebody thinks I have something worth listening to." I didn't say "often."

I love this cyber-electronic stuff. I've even tried my hand at starting and maintaining discussion lists, which you may want to check out if you are weird enough to have any of the interests I've spattered all over these pages.

But more than this cyber-electronic stuff, I love my wife, Jeannine nee Jeannine Carol Jung (daughter of Jacob Ludwig Jung, which is a key to her ethnicity and explains why we were for over a decade a Lutheran family). She is a native of Chicago and a Graduate of Mundelein College. Until her retirment, she was a paralegal for an intellectual property firm. By vocation she was, and is, an active Church member. She is a superlative mother to our pets (to see our pets, present and past, click here). We found each other fairly late in life. We met in church, and sat in the same pew together (fifth row from the front, just off the center aisle on the left side), attended Taize Vespers, and generally shared a spiritual path for over a year before I worked up the nerve to ask her out. I think myself a very lucky man. All of our friends agree. We belong to the Community of Saint Francis.

So, tell me about you. If you've made it this far on this home page, you've heard more than enough about me.