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One can only guess at the course Shambaugh might have set for the SHSI had the legislative outcome been different in 1909. Swisher and others have claimed that Shambaugh always had a “clear idea of his longrange plans,” that he began “develop[ing] a plan for the type of institution he wanted the historical society to become” from the time he joined the Board of Curators in 1897, and that “his goal was to create a laboratory for scientific historical research and publication.”1 In a general sense, all of this is true; Shambaugh began with a progressive-era vision of the greater value of history to society. He embraced the notion of history as scientific expertise, and he was unshakably committed to utilizing the knowledge of history in public service. However, with respect to the policy studies that were to become the heart of applied history at the SHSI, Shambaugh was open to a more collaborative arrangement prior to the legislative fiasco, with the society in Iowa City providing a broad-based research and publications program and a legislative research bureau in Des Moines focusing more specifically on issue-driven policy research. The setback seems to have galvanized Shambaugh’s resolve to prove the value of history in modern society. In any event, the idea of a legislative research bureau certainly had been gestating for some time. When in 1902 the Carnegie Institution established a Bureau of Historical Research in Washington, D.C., for instance, Shambaugh solicited a brief descriptive article from the director, Andrew McLaughlin.2 The Carnegie Institution and the Library of Congress were the institutions Shambaugh had in mind when he revealed to John Brindley his idea of a research bureau utilizing sources available in Des Moines, Iowa City, and Washington, D.C. He reiterated this intent in a pocketsized booklet issued in 1908, called Historical Research in the State Historical A Deliberate Course: Applied History 4 77 Society of Iowa and without doubt printed expressly to influence political leaders favorably toward the proposed bureau. “Neither partisan bias nor personal prejudice is allowed to enter into the work of those who are engaged in research for the Society,” the booklet announced. “Manifestly the research work of The State Historical Society should be correlated with whatever is attempted along the lines of State legislative reference work.”3 By mid 1909, Shambaugh had turned his attention to developing his “laboratory concept” of history in earnest as a function of the society alone; the historical department in Des Moines was not to be involved at all. From then on, he concentrated on building the SHSI’s research capacity and strengthening its ties to the university. Having failed in his bid to establish a legislative research bureau in the state capital, Shambaugh transformed the concept into an institution that bore his personal stamp, an entity that filled a niche between the SHSI and the political science department at the University of Iowa. To be sure, Shambaugh’s “laboratory concept” was based on the society ’s research publications program, which at this point comprised the Public Archives Series and the Iowa Journal of History and Politics. But it was to become much more than that. As his concept has been summarized elsewhere, “the Society would serve as an institution to bring together a team of specialists (professional historians) in a common location, provide them with the best available resources (a reference library, research facilities, and travel funds), assign them to specific problems that were part of a larger whole (a carefully planned, long-term research program), and make the results of their research (monographic and journal publications ) available to a larger public that could, in this way, benefit from their work.”4 By 1910, Shambaugh was referring to his research group as “The School of Iowa Research Historians,” and its purpose was “to make practical application of investigations in State and local history in the solution of present-day political, social, and economic problems.”5 Because Shambaugh held tandem professional positions, his scientificlaboratory approach to historical research was more easily workable. He groomed graduate students for applied historical research; routinely consulted with legislators and other prominent people in state affairs to cultivate an ongoing list of contemporary issues; then coordinated research assignments and supervised the research, writing, and editing.6 Had the 1909 legislative battle gone the other way, the applied history research laboratory no doubt would have been structured differently, with John Brind78 Deliberate Course Deliberate Course 79 ley playing...

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