Upcoming Research
Book Length Projects
Sex, Society, & States: Governing Sexuality in the early republican Trans-Appalachian West (tentative title)
“Frontier” Households
If the ideal household in colonial and early republican America was headed by a heterosexual married couple, how common was this ideal? Put differently, how common were households who did not fit this ideal and what was their make up? Did these non-ideal households create opportunities for blurring gender roles or at least toleration of same-sex intimate behavior? How did Euro-American communities react to or try to govern and reduce the presence of these non-ideal households? How can studying census records, with a focus on who made up a household, help us queer early American history and settlement?
Article Length Projects
Divorce at the turn of the 19th Century
Numerous historians have highlighted how legal divorce became more available and standardized in many parts of the United States after its war for independence, particularly in the new states west of the Appalachian Mountains. At the same time, many continue to characterize it as rare and shamed, only becoming a national phenomenon and topic around 1850. I utilize legal records and advertisements of self divorces in newspapers from one county in Ohio (a surprisingly neglected state in studies of divorce) in the first decades of the nineteenth century to argue the existence of consistent knowledge, presence, and toleration of marital separation within the new state’s settler communities. Instead of focusing on a divorce rate, I suggest a measurement of frequency, or how often the possibility of divorce was visible in print or a courtroom, to represent an entry into how Euro-American settlers felt about divorce and marriage.
Manifest Domesticity & American Manhood
This article takes up Amy Kaplan’s idea of “Manifest Domesticity” (American Literature, Sept 1998) as an essential part of American settlers’ justification for expansion across North America and the vision of the home they wanted to establish throughout the nation. Instead of focusing on women, I emphasize how domesticity was also about an ideal for men. The over 100 surviving letters of a courtship that lasted from 1818 to 1821 between a Euro-American, New England-born couple provide the evidence
I am completing an article for review that uses the over 100 surviving letters of a courtship that lasted from 1818 to 1821 of an elite, Euro-American, New England-born couple to demonstrate how Euro-American settlers imagined they could establish their cultural norms of courtship, marriage, romance, and emotion in the new Western states. In contrast to my dissertation, this article focuses on the emotional parts of defining and ordering sexuality, of particular significance to middle class and elite Euro-Americans who dominated American culture and politics in an era that emphasized sentiment and affective ties.
The 1820 Queen Caroline Affair
The American press was fascinated by this high profile divorce case, more so than by any local divorce(s) or the growing normality of divorce in American society. What can this event tell us about Euro-Americans' opinions of divorce and sexuality, as well as their remaining connections to and fascination of British culture, politics, and royalty?
Sexual Scandal & Politics in Local Ohio Politics
In the decades after the American War for Independence, newspapers and public print rarely included overt references to sexuality, even neglecting to print accounts of sexual behaviors tried in the local courts. A case of the crime of rape in 1810 Clermont County, however, produced unusual public documentation because the man accused, Thomas Morris, was a member of the State of Ohio’s House of Representatives. The accused sexual behavior produced and grounded the case, but public reporting on it quickly veered to broader public issues in the new settler state, particularly debates between Federalists and Democratic-Republicans over the relationship between government and society, especially the issue of judicial review. In this article I hope to explore how ideas and worries about male sexuality and aggression sparked such wider discussion of political issues, as well as the ways the judicial system and American legal norms worked in a new American community.
In my travels for my first book project, I came upon many, usually very dusty, documents that ended up as not directly relevant to that project, but sparked my interest. I’m not sure what the final projects may look like, but these are some of the collections I’d like to return to.
Knox County, Indiana Court Records (1780s-?): Home to the first American territorial capital of Indiana, as well as a previous French settlement, these are some of the earliest records available for United States settlement of the Northwest Territory. Perhaps a history of women & gender in the courtroom like Cornelia Dayton completed for colonial and early republican Connecticut? Perhaps a broader social history of the county like Faragher's Sugar Creek? In short, we need more localized studies of communities during the Early Republic and this extensive set of court records would allow this to happen.
Posey County, Indiana Circuit Court Case Files (1815-1855)
Governor of Ohio Pardons and State Penitentiary Files
Indiana State Penitentiary Records
Cuyahoga County, Ohio Divorce Case Files (late 1800s)
Greene, Greene-Roelker, and Wulsin Collections at the Cincinnati History Library & Archives: A fantastic collection of personal correspondence that covers many key aspects of 19th century American history--courtship & marriage, immigration, race, growth of the middle class, sectionalism, urbanization