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Lecture addresses link between business and technology
March 09, 2007
Richard R. John, professor of history at the University of Illinois at Chicago, will speak at the second annul Dale E. Benson Lecture in Business and Economic History on Monday, March 19 at 7:30 p.m. in the Scandinavian Cultural Center.
John’s lecture is titled “Network Nation: How Politics Shaped American Telecommunications from the War of 1812 to Bell Labs.” In it, he will address the democratization and liberalization of America’s national market through the telecommunications revolution in the nineteenth-century.
The lecture is free and open to the public.
John has taught history at the University of Illinois at Chicago for nearly 17 years, and he has received numerous honors and awards during his career. These include the Harold F. Williamson Prize, which is given by the Business History Conference to a scholar at mid-career who has made “significant contributions to the field of business history,” and the Newcomen-Harvard Prize for the best essay in the Business History Review.
Additionally, John received the Lloyd Lewis Fellowship from the Newberry Library in Chicago; a fellowship from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.; and a John E. Rovensky Fellowship in Business and Economic History from the Lincoln Educational Achievement Foundation in Michigan. In the spring of 2001, John was a visiting professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris.
John is the author or editor of six books and 38 articles on American business, technology and communications history, and American political and institutional development. Throughout his career, John has devoted his scholarship to the intersection of business, politics and the commercialization of new communications technologies, such as mail delivery, telegraphy, telephony and computers.
His first book, “Spreading the News: The American Postal System from Franklin to Morse,” won a total of six prizes. John has served on the editorial boards of several prestigious business journals, including Enterprise and Society, and Business History Review.
Currently, John is a member of the advisory council of the National Postal Museum at the Smithsonian Institution. His forthcoming book employs the same title as his PLU speech. John received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees from Harvard University.
The lecture is presented by the Benson Family Foundation of Portland. A gift from the foundation created the first endowed chair at PLU, a position currently held by history professor E. Wayne Carp. The foundation was created by alumni Dale ’63 and Jolita (Hylland ’63) Benson.
The lecture is free and open to the public.
John has taught history at the University of Illinois at Chicago for nearly 17 years, and he has received numerous honors and awards during his career. These include the Harold F. Williamson Prize, which is given by the Business History Conference to a scholar at mid-career who has made “significant contributions to the field of business history,” and the Newcomen-Harvard Prize for the best essay in the Business History Review.
Additionally, John received the Lloyd Lewis Fellowship from the Newberry Library in Chicago; a fellowship from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.; and a John E. Rovensky Fellowship in Business and Economic History from the Lincoln Educational Achievement Foundation in Michigan. In the spring of 2001, John was a visiting professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris.
John is the author or editor of six books and 38 articles on American business, technology and communications history, and American political and institutional development. Throughout his career, John has devoted his scholarship to the intersection of business, politics and the commercialization of new communications technologies, such as mail delivery, telegraphy, telephony and computers.
His first book, “Spreading the News: The American Postal System from Franklin to Morse,” won a total of six prizes. John has served on the editorial boards of several prestigious business journals, including Enterprise and Society, and Business History Review.
Currently, John is a member of the advisory council of the National Postal Museum at the Smithsonian Institution. His forthcoming book employs the same title as his PLU speech. John received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees from Harvard University.
The lecture is presented by the Benson Family Foundation of Portland. A gift from the foundation created the first endowed chair at PLU, a position currently held by history professor E. Wayne Carp. The foundation was created by alumni Dale ’63 and Jolita (Hylland ’63) Benson.