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vii ac know l edgment s I received crucial financial support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Council for European Studies. The University of Michigan’s Eisenberg Institute for Historical Studies provided me with a supportive environment and resources as I completed this project. Texas A&M University has supplied institutional assistance in the form of time and money, particularly from the College of Liberal Arts, the History Department, and the Melbern G. Glasscock Center for Humanities Research. I have benefited greatly from the help of many librarians and archivists responsible for the collections I have plumbed, especially those at the Archives nationales, Bibliothèque nationale, Archives de Paris, Archives départementales de l’Indre (with special thanks to the director, Marc du Pouget), du Cher, de l’Indre-et-Loire, and de la Haute-Vienne, the Bibliothèque and Archives de l’Institut de France, the Institut Mémoires de l’édition contemporaine (IMEC), the Bibliothèque de la bande dessinée (Angoulême), Musée-Hôtel Bertrand in Châteauroux (especially Michèle Naturel), the Service historique de la défense, and the Archives municipales de Bruxelles. In Buzançais, I found support and encouragement. I particularly thank Mayor Régis Blanchet for the information he supplied and his excitement about the project. Patrick Lepas invited me into his home and to rehearsals of the outdoor spectacle’s performance. He and Léandre Boizeau graciously answered numerous appeals for information about their work. I would like to thank especially Philippe Hénin, France-Soir’s archivist, for his assistance in finding a reproducible copy of Crime ne paie pas, and FranceSoir ’s management for permission to reproduce images. Many people, colleagues and friends, have taken the time to read the manuscript in whole or in part and to share their comments with me. They include Julia Blackwelder, John Bohstedt, Kate Engel, Margaret Ezell, Manfred Gailus , Martin Geyer, Carol Harrison, April Hatfield, Melanie Hawthorne, Sylvia Acknowledgments viii Hoffert, Jeff Horn, Jo Burr Margadant, Ted Margadant, Pam Matthews, Peter McPhee, Jeremy Popkin, Jim Rosenheim, Rebecca Schloss, David Vaught, and Jocelyn Wills. Further thanks go to panelists and audiences at multiple conferences where I have presented drafts of my work, who have offered helpful feedback, and my students, graduate and undergraduate, who have proved encouragingly insightful . My department heads at Texas A&M, Julia Blackwelder and Walter Buenger, have supported me throughout. I have received strategically important technical assistance from Steven Schloss. I offer special thanks to the people at LSU Press who did so much to facilitate the process of turning a manuscript into book: Alisa Plant (acquisitions editor), Catherine L.Kadair (production editor), and Michelle Neustrom (book designer). Grace Carino expertly performed the crucial task of copyediting. Penny Livesay has plied her amazing editorial skills and found le mot juste more times than I can count. I thank my family and friends for their encouragement and support. My son, Kevin, has grown up with French history with (mostly) good humor. ...

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