WHA Awards Its Second Annual Book Prize

The World History Association awarded its second book prize at its annual meeting at Northeastern University in Boston in June 2000. The recipients were James McClellan III and Harold Dorn for their book, Science and Technology in World History: An Introduction (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999, available in paperback). The authors, both of whom teach at Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey, were able to attend the conference banquet and receive their certificates and checks for $150.

The WHA Book Award Committee jurors chose this book because they felt it best fulfilled the award criterion of "history from a global perspective" among books published in 1999. One juror described it as "a global history survey text with science and technology as the central theme." Another called it "the best survey text in the history of science, and probably the first to be taken seriously by the profession, since ... 1956," and another saw it as "the first dedicated treatment of themes familiar to historians of science, for a general audience of world historians."

Science and Technology in World History is already being used as a college textbook, and it stands out for its coverage of regions as far afield as China, the Muslim world, pre-Columbian America, and the West, as well as a nice balance among ancient, medieval and modern time periods. It provides a valuable point of departure for the comparative analysis of a major marker of change used by archaeologists and historians: technology. The next award, for a book published in 2000, will be announced at the June meeting of the WHA in 2001.

NASOH Announces Its Book Awards

At its annual meeting held in May 2000, the North American Society for Oceanic History announced the recipients of the John Lyman Book Awards give annually to recognize outstanding books dealing with the maritime and naval history of North America. The awards went to the following authors, whose books were published in 1999. Canadian Naval and Maritime History: James P. Delgado, Across the Top of the World: The Quest for the Northwest Passage (Checkmark Books); U.S. Naval and Maritime History: Charles R. Schultz, Forty-Niners 'round the Horn (University of South Carolina Press); Honorable Mention: Alexander Boyd Hawes, Off Soundings: Aspects of Maritime History of Rhode Island (Posterity Press); Reference Work and Published Primary Source: Robert J. Cressman, The Official Chronology of the U.S. Navy in World War II (Naval Institute Press); Biography and Autobiography: Craig Symonds, Confederate Admiral: The Life and Wars of Franklin Buchanan (Naval Institute Press).

The awards committee was composed of James C. Bradford, chair (Texas A & M Univ.); James Morris (Christopher Newport Univ.); William A. Peter (Mystic Seaport Museum); and Richard Tuck (Allegheny College).

AASLH Announces Award Winners for 2000

The American Association for State and Local History announced the winners of its 55th annual awards program, which recognizes achievement in the preservation and interpretation of local, state, and regional history. The Albert B. Corey Award, reserved for small, primarily volunteer-operated historical organizations in America, was awarded to the Between the Rivers Preservation Organization of Eddyville, Kentucky, for its project, "Rescue Our Cemeteries." Awards of Merit and Certificates of Commendation were given to more than 70 other organizations for their efforts in the fields of state and local history.

Details about the awards and program and the association can be obtained from the AASLH web site at http://www.aaslh.org or by calling (615) 320-3203.