Acknowledgments

A wise person once said that it takes a whole village to raise a child. Bringing a book into being, I have discovered, is no solitary enterprise either. Without the people who graced this project with personal support, intellectual interest, and plain old curiosity, there would surely be no book at all. My heartfelt thanks to everyone who has been part of my village during the past several years, including the many who go unnamed below.

A number of individuals read large portions of the manuscript and responded with questions that invariably enriched my perspective, even though I could not always answer them well, or sometimes at all. Gerry Grob went especially far out of his way to help me, and it made all the difference. Peter Buck, Jim Capshew, Cynthia Enloe, Ben Harris, Steve Heims, Jim Kloppenberg, Jill Morawski, Sam Schweber, Andy Scull, Mark Solovey, and Steve Whitfield were kind and generous readers. Their collective breadth of knowledge sustained my search for common ground between diverse historical and social scientific fields. It goes without saying that I alone am guilty of whatever errors of fact and interpretation are to be found in the following pages.

I am also grateful to those who lifted my spirits by insisting that I had something of value to say, usually a long time before they had any reason to believe that I actually did. For their confidence, my sincerest thanks go to Betty Bayer, Larry Friedman, Laurel Furumoto, Walter Jackson, Wendy Kaminer, Jeff Masson, Henry Minton, Barbara Tischler, Fernando Vidal, and Bill Woodward.

The History of American Civilization Program at Brandeis University, and the Crown Fellowship, provided me with all-important material aid while I was a graduate student. My research was also financially supported, at the beginning, by a grant from the Rockefeller Archive Center and, at the end, by the Dibner Summer Grant for Research in History of Science. Without the vast resources of Widener Library, my task would have been much more difficult.

During the past several years, students at the University of Massachusetts at Boston and Harvard University have provided me with new appreciation for the challenge of combining critical intelligence with historical imagination. I hope that this book returns some small measure of the favor they have done me. My deepest thanks to Julie Schor, for her advocacy on my behalf, and to the Harvard Committee on Degrees in Women's Studies, for the always warm welcome and great food. I am indebted to Judy Vichniac, John McCole, and the Harvard Committee on Degrees in Social Studies for providing me with a wonderful place to hang my hat and pursue my education.

Elizabeth Knoll, editor extraordinaire at the University of California Press, has, from the very first, been just the sort of smart critic and enthusiastic advocate I wanted. Not only did she believe in what I was trying to accomplish; she helped me get there. For their important contributions to the bookmaking process, I would also like to thank Peter Kosenko for his meticulous copyediting, Rebecca Frazier for her varied talents in production management and scheduling, and Diana Feinberg for skilled assistance with promotion and illustrations.

My former co-workers at South End Press—especially Michael Albert, Carl Conetta, Todd Jailer, Mary Lea, Cynthia Peters, Lydia Sargent, John Schall, and Pat Walker—contributed more than they ever realized to my education. The writers whose ideas we were privileged to publish are too numerous to mention here, but their example has never ceased to inspire me.

Without a community of good friends, the time I spent on this book would have been a lot less fun than it was. For their inexhaustible reserves of good humor and willingness to endure my stubborn interest in psychology and its mysterious ways, thanks to Barbara Beltrand, Steve Birnbaum, Michael Bronski, Amy Hoffman, Carol Katz, Sue Landers, Ellen Lapowsky, and Kate Raisz. Alejandro de Avila has become a treasured member of my family as well as a dear friend. He will always have my love and profound gratitude for the door he opened several years ago.

Finally, there is no language fit to acknowledge the gift of love I have received from my immediate family. For once, words are not necessary. Lynn Stephen and Gabriel Stephen-Herman know exactly how I feel.