Editor's Note
Rent from DeepDyveCompleting work on an issue always feels like a watershed, but this issue is particularly poignant for me. This fall, I conclude an eight-year term editing for the McNeil Center for Early American Studies. Relief and nostalgia vie for the foremost position in my mind. It's been my great honor and pleasure to serve an organization that I love and respect. I recall that, in my senior year at Manchester College, my advisor David Waas asked me "what I would do with my history major." I told him I wanted to find some way to combine my love of history and enjoyment of editing. The Center, which became my academic home a dozen years ago, has allowed me to do just that.
Being an editor combines the best of two worlds: learning something new constantly, and enjoying the company of smart, interested, interesting people. I am deeply appreciative of all the authors who have allowed me to hack at their prose, first when I joined my friend and mentor Bill Pencak to create Explorations in Early American Culture as an annual supplement to Pennsylvania History and then, after 2002, when Bob McNeil's generosity allowed the Center to create this academic journal that takes its longstanding mission to a worldwide audience who cannot necessarily attend every Friday seminar. I'm not quite sure I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to be founding editor of an interdisciplinary scholarly journal, but the years that have followed have been a thrilling, if sometimes exhausting, ride. The support and encouragement of the Center's directors, Richard S. Dunn and Daniel K. Richter, have been personally and professionally invaluable to me. The Center's staff, including Zelini Hubbard, Max Fraser, and the incomparable Amy Baxter-Bellamy have been of great assistance in keeping the business affairs of the publication in order.
Early American Studies would not have been possible without the support of the many dedicated people. First, the members of the editorial board, including Elaine Crane, Richard Dunn, Nicole Eustace, Cathy Matson, Carla Mulford, John Murrin, Bill Pencak, Ros Remer, Dick Ryerson, John Sweet, Judy Van Buskirk, and Stevie Wolf have done outstanding work reading manuscripts, creating editorial policies, and maintaining my sanity. The staff at Penn Press, including Erica Ginsburg, Renee Ricker, and Susan Day, have provided support, maintained consistent professional publication standards, and tolerated my schedule that has included terms like "June-ish." The scores of peer reviewers around the globe, whose blind status denies them the thanks they deserve, have created a quality publication with scholarly rigor. [End Page v] The staffs of the numerous archives and museums have hunted down the fantastic illustrations that have been a hallmark of this journal. My editorial assistants Jennifer Lawhorn and Debbie Miller took on much of the "heavy lifting" of journal production in the past few years. The financial and moral support provided by Penn State's Kathryn Robinson and William Mahar were invaluable. Paul Alles has lived with a journal, its authors, its editorial board, and its editor with good humor and good sense; surely, that deserves some line on a vita.
Deciding to retire from editing this journal was a tough decision, but one made much easier in knowing that Elaine Forman Crane will take over upon my departure. Elaine's reputation as an editor is legendary, primarily for her work on the diary of Elizabeth Sandwith Drinker. She has been an outstanding member of the EAS editorial board, and I know that her knowledge and dedication will lead to great things in the years ahead.
When I announced a year ago that I would be stepping down as editor to devote more time to my own writing, friends in the Center community kept saying "I can't believe you're giving it up!" I told them "I am, but I'm not really going anywhere." I look forward to decades of McNeil seminars...
