What was the vision of urban history when the journal was founded (take a look at the inaugural issue)?
Looking at recent issues, how has that vision both been realized and altered?
What newer themes do scholars of urban history address?
In the inaugural issue, Raymond A. Mohl of Florida Atlantic University wrote that the Journal of Urban History had been established to provide urban scholars with a forum for interpretation and new research. As a new area of study, the editors were willing to encourage any lines of study that might provide more information on urban history. The editors did not intend to restrict research by time period or location. Room is left to chart new avenues of historical research.
Some of my favorite articles were actually written in the first volumes. “Tracing Those Who Left” was printed in the first issue, and outlined the problems researchers faced when attempting to follow or link people in the 1880 and 1900 census records. Genealogy research would have been a tremendous labor with no name indexes. Without exhaustive searches through each census manuscript looking for a certain individual, connections would have been slow and very few. Contrasted with today’s genealogy research, this particular article reminds me how fortunate we are to have technology and the ease in which we can now search through census manuscripts.
Several of the earlier articles in the Journal of Urban History were written about the physical aspects of cities, but moved toward broader topics like art in cities, the carceral environment of cities, and reasons people from rural environments were attracted to cities. International topics are still found in the Journal and I think that in addition to their continued presence international authors should also be given space and perspective.
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