McConville, Brendan 1962-

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McConville, Brendan 1962-

PERSONAL:

Born 1962. Education: Reed College, Portland, OR, B.A., 1985; Brown University, M.A., 1987, Ph.D., 1992.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of History, Boston University, 226 Bay State Rd., Boston, MA. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

State University of New York at Binghamton, assistant professor, 1992-98, associate professor of history, 1999-2004; Boston University, Boston, MA, professor of history, 2004—.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Structural Steel and Ornamental Iron Association of Northern New Jersey Scholarship, 1980-84; Thomas J. Watson Foundation Fellowship, 1985-86; New Jersey Historical Commission Dissertation Grant, 1990-92; Philadelphia Center for Early American Studies Dissertation Fellowship, 1990-91; John Lax Fellowship, Brown University, 1991-92; National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Research Fellowship, 1993; New Jersey Historical Commission Research Fellowship, 1994-95; Driscoll Prize, 1994, for These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace; National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for University Professors, 1995-96; Mayer Fellowship (declined), Huntington Library, 1998-99; Barbara S. Mosbacher Fellowship, John Carter Brown Library, 1998; Senior Research Post-Doctoral Fellowship, McNeil Center for Early American Studies, University of Pennsylvania, 2000-01; Richard P. McCormick Award, New Jersey Historical Commission, 2001, for These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace; Society of the Cincinnati Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Early American History relating to the Mid-Atlantic, 2003, for These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace.

WRITINGS:

These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace: The Struggle for Property and Power in Early New Jersey, Cornell University Press (Ithaca, NY), 1999.

(With Robin Doak) New Jersey, National Geographic (Washington, DC), 2005.

(With Michael Burgan) Massachusetts, National Geographic (Washington, DC), 2005.

The King's Three Faces: The Rise and Fall of Royal America, 1688-1776, University of North Carolina Press (Chapel Hill, NC), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

Brendan McConville's interests include the history of New England and the eastern United States, particularly New Jersey, as well as colonial issues. These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace: The Struggle for Property and Power in Early New Jersey presents a detailed study of land disputes that occurred in New Jersey during the colonial period, and of colonists' attitudes toward the British monarchy in the years prior to the American Revolution. The land disputes arose between the gentry who owned the land and yeoman farmers who worked it. Numerous factors contributed to the disputes, including questions of the legitimacy of numerous land grants; controversy regarding the placement of the borderline that divided east and west New Jersey; and doubts of the legitimacy of English claims to land acquired from Native Americans. In other cases, the farmers whose labor coaxed a living from the land resented the official presences on the land they interacted with every day. In these cases, the farmers simply ignored official claims and squatted on the land they worked. These disputes led to a number of riots spearheaded by the farmers, as well as to violence that affected how New Jersey evolved as a state. "The subsequent violence that emerged out of these conflicting claims to land in New Jersey was multiethnic, multicultural, and multiracial, and it shaped New Jersey on the eve of the American Revolution," commented Thomas J. Humphrey in the Journal of American History.

McConville structures his work around a chronological discussion of the origin of the land disputes, interspersed with biographies of important individuals involved in the early development of the state. He points out the diverse ethnic backgrounds, religions, and social standings of the persons involved in the land riots that erupted in the 1740s and 1750s. These characteristics, McConville argues, were important to the evolution of the participants' attitudes toward their entitlement to land. The gentry, for example, thought their enlightened education and political authority gave them the right to ownership of the land, whereas yeomen farmers and others felt that their occupancy and labor established their entitlement. The riots that resulted profoundly changed the political and social structure of New Jersey, setting the stage for revolution within the next two decades. Humphrey concluded that "McConville's book provides an easily read and much needed analysis of New Jersey in the colonial period."

McConville's more recent The King's Three Faces: The Rise and Fall of Royal America is a study of Americans' attitudes toward their British rulers just prior to the American Revolution. Readers might find it surprising that many average Americans were actually very loyal to England, but that various social, religious, and political forces slowly eroded that loyalty. Reviewing the book in Library Journal, Douglas King stated that the author offers "an insightful and provocative read, challenging our attitudes and assumptions about the mind-set of American Colonists."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Journal of Legal History, January 1, 2000, Evan Haefeli, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace: The Struggle for Property and Power in Early New Jersey, p. 100.

Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, April 1, 2000, M.J. Birkner, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 1532.

Journal of American History, September, 2000, Thomas J. Humphrey, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 644.

Journal of Economic Literature, March 1, 2000, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 239.

Law and History Review, Fall 2001, Terry Bouton, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 661.

Library Journal, September 15, 2006, Douglas King, review of The King's Three Faces: The Rise and Fall of Royal America, 1688-1776, p. 72.

Reviews in American History, September, 2000, Graham Russell Hodges, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 381.

Social History, January 1, 2001, Michael A. Bellesiles, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 110.

William and Mary Quarterly, April, 2000, Marjoleine Kars, review of These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace, p. 442.