Although I am not a full-time academic, I have continued to pursue historical research, and present roughly one paper each year at a history conference.  I have also been teaching as part of the Barnard/Columbia urban studies program, where I have been able to combine my interests in urban history and urban policy.

Education

Ph.D., U.S. History, Columbia University, 2002

  Dissertation: “Seat of Empire: New York, Philadelphia, and the Emergence of an American Metropolis,

  1776-1837.”  Advisor: Professor Kenneth T. Jackson

  (click here to see the abstract on ProQuest)

M.B.A., Finance, Columbia Business School, 2000

M.A., Canadian History, Queen’s University (Kingston, Ontario), 1996

  Thesis: “American Trade and Urban Dominance in Upper Canada, 1830-1850.” 

  Advisor: Professor Gerald D. Tulchinsky

B.A., History, magna cum laude, Columbia University, 1993

Teaching Experience:

Barnard College/Columbia University Urban Studies Program

1. •Research Fellow, non-resident (2010-current)
   

2. •Adjunct Associate Professor, 2008-2009
   

3. •Fall 2009: The Shaping of the Modern City V3545x (U.S. urban history colloquium) (click for syllabus)
   

4. •Fall 2008-Spring 2009: Senior Seminar in Urban Studies: The Built Environment V3992x-V3993y (senior thesis research seminar) (click for syllabus)
   

Columbia College (Columbia University) Core Curriculum

1. •Preceptor of Contemporary Civilization C1101x-C1102y (Fall 2000-Fall 2001)
   

Published Articles in History and Urban Studies

“Not Predestination: New York Harbor and the Challenge of Philadelphia,” New-York Journal of American History LXVII (forthcoming). (click here for link to the pdf file)

“Chants Plutocratic: Four Books on New York City’s Commercial Elites,” review essay, Journal of Urban History, 31:4 (May 2005), pp. 554-564. (click here for link to the article on Sage Publications’ website)

“‘Non-Resident Me’: John Bartlett Brebner, Nationalism, and the Canadian Historical Profession,” Journal of the Canadian Historical Association, new series 10 (1999), pp. 237-277.  (Click here for the pdf of the article)

1. (Note: Elizabeth B. Elliot-Meisel has written an interesting article that uses access to Brebner family papers and relatives to correct some suppositions my article made based only on Brebner’s public papers.  See her article here.)
   

“What Does New York City Say?,” review of Gotham: A History of New York to 1898, by Edwin Burrows and Mike Wallace, and American Metropolis: A History of New York City, by George J. Lankevich, H-Urban (e-mail list), American Historical Association, February 1999.  (Click for link.)

“The Hudson River Railroad and the Development of Irvington, New York, 1849-1860,” Hudson Valley Regional Review, 10:2 (September 1993), pp. 51-80.

Academic Presentations:

“‘The Overgrown Monster’: London, Big Government, and the Idea of an American Capital,” Cities and Nationalisms Conference (Centre for Metropolitan History), London, England, June 18, 2010 (read in absentia).

“Banks and the Selection of Washington, D.C., as the National Capital,” annual meeting of the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, Salt Lake City, Utah, June 11-14, 2009.

“Frenchified Philadelphia and British New York?: European Connections and the Commerce of the Mid-Atlantic, 1790–1812,” annual meeting of the American Historical Association, Washington, DC, January 5, 2008.

“Twin Cities of the New Republic?: Comparing the Commerce of New York and Philadelphia, 1790-1812,” annual meeting of the Pennsylvania Historical Association, Philadelphia, PA, October 20, 2006.

“‘I Want a Packet’: Communications, Government, and New York’s Ambiguous Career as the British Headquarters of America,” Conference on New York State History, New York, NY, June 1, 2006.

“New York, Philadelphia, and the Emergence of an American Metropolis, 1776-1837,” annual meeting of the Organization of American Historians, Memphis, Tennessee, April 6, 2003.

“Empire City, Empire State: Upstate as a Factor in the Rise of New York City, 1780-1850,” Gotham Center Conference on New York City History, October 7, 2001.

"The Developer's Frontier and the Rise of New York, 1790-1840," Conference on New York State History, Aurora, New York, June 6, 2001.

"The Urban Hinterland:  Centralization and the Rise of New York Port, 1780-1825," Economic and Business History Society Conference, Albany, New York, April 26, 2001.