Brian Leech
@brianleechphd.bsky.social
Historian of American West, Midwest, environmental history, mining, energy, food, animals. Currently working on a book about the history of U.S. speed limits & another book about mining in popular culture. https://brianleechphd.net
Reposted by Brian Leech
"While other universities report that the humanities are shrinking, at Berkeley, the opposite is true. The music major is the fastest-growing major on campus. We are finding bigger classrooms because film is exploding. English is back to the numbers we saw 15 years ago. We are hiring" bit.ly/4ohKuOe
"The humanities really are a resource — a confidence for living in our times.” Dean Sara Guyer on the modern utility of humanities degrees
This interview originally appeared on the Division of Arts
bit.ly
November 23, 2025 at 3:38 PM
"While other universities report that the humanities are shrinking, at Berkeley, the opposite is true. The music major is the fastest-growing major on campus. We are finding bigger classrooms because film is exploding. English is back to the numbers we saw 15 years ago. We are hiring" bit.ly/4ohKuOe
Reposted by Brian Leech
I get what the WSJ is trying to say about a more fractured FOMC but the chart they use in the story sure seems to contradict their premise. www.wsj.com/economy/cent...
November 22, 2025 at 9:28 PM
I get what the WSJ is trying to say about a more fractured FOMC but the chart they use in the story sure seems to contradict their premise. www.wsj.com/economy/cent...
Reposted by Brian Leech
Relying on ChatGPT to teach you about a topic leaves you with shallower knowledge than Googling and reading about it, according to new research that compared what more than 10,000 people knew after using one method or the other.
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
November 21, 2025 at 11:48 AM
Relying on ChatGPT to teach you about a topic leaves you with shallower knowledge than Googling and reading about it, according to new research that compared what more than 10,000 people knew after using one method or the other.
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
Reposted by Brian Leech
Reposted by Brian Leech
I am very pleased and grateful to share this announcement of our recent award from the @wellcometrust.bsky.social for a project on history of smallpox and measles #histmed #histsci news.exeter.ac.uk/faculty-of-h... The project will be based @exeter.ac.uk @cceh-u24.bsky.social led by ... 1/2
Exeter scholars secure significant research funding to investigate the early history of Smallpox and Measles
The early histories of smallpox and measles – and the insight they might offer to contemporary health and medicine – will be under the microscope of a new research project. Pustules, Palaeogenetics an...
news.exeter.ac.uk
November 19, 2025 at 12:54 PM
I am very pleased and grateful to share this announcement of our recent award from the @wellcometrust.bsky.social for a project on history of smallpox and measles #histmed #histsci news.exeter.ac.uk/faculty-of-h... The project will be based @exeter.ac.uk @cceh-u24.bsky.social led by ... 1/2
Reposted by Brian Leech
Colleague just got an email that starts: "Here's a polished and respectful letter you can send to your professor"
Email from a student who turned in a ChatGPT essay. Not even looking at the ChatGPT output in the apology 🥴
![Dear [Professor’s Name],
I want to sincerely apologize for my actions regarding my midterm submission.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:fs6z2b756buwsdsjkle6utfi/bafkreiecvhzfgr4tlwyy2mvpbvjncqkysytwsxvidaoressh7peonoso3y@jpeg)
November 17, 2025 at 9:28 PM
Colleague just got an email that starts: "Here's a polished and respectful letter you can send to your professor"
Reposted by Brian Leech
Thousands of documents related to Amelia Earhart, the aviator who vanished in 1937 while attempting to become the first woman to circumnavigate the world, were published online by the National Archives on Friday but Earhart experts said the collection was a dud.
Trump Administration Releases Thousands of Amelia Earhart Files
More than 4,000 documents related to Earhart were posted online, but scholars were not impressed. The release coincides with a period of intensified interest in the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein and his connection to the president.
nyti.ms
November 18, 2025 at 4:30 AM
Thousands of documents related to Amelia Earhart, the aviator who vanished in 1937 while attempting to become the first woman to circumnavigate the world, were published online by the National Archives on Friday but Earhart experts said the collection was a dud.
To the five separate people who stopped me, honked at me, or yelled across the parking lot at me during my short trip to the grocery store: thanks! I have now pumped up my low back tire. We often forget that most people are helpful.
November 9, 2025 at 9:41 PM
To the five separate people who stopped me, honked at me, or yelled across the parking lot at me during my short trip to the grocery store: thanks! I have now pumped up my low back tire. We often forget that most people are helpful.
Nice to read this celebration of hand-drawn movie poster designers, which reminds me that I have some great original movie posters framed and sitting in my basement, waiting to be re-hung. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/01/m...
The Poster Designers Who Helped Bring Movies to Life
www.nytimes.com
November 9, 2025 at 6:14 PM
Nice to read this celebration of hand-drawn movie poster designers, which reminds me that I have some great original movie posters framed and sitting in my basement, waiting to be re-hung. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/01/m...
For some reason I get emails every week about food recalls. The craziest are listeria because the symptoms of an infection usually start within 2 weeks after eating contaminated food but may start as early as the same day or as late as 10 weeks after. This seems unfair to us humans, listeria.
November 6, 2025 at 5:17 AM
For some reason I get emails every week about food recalls. The craziest are listeria because the symptoms of an infection usually start within 2 weeks after eating contaminated food but may start as early as the same day or as late as 10 weeks after. This seems unfair to us humans, listeria.
Reposted by Brian Leech
Hoping for some academic help...updating my readings in a Monsters class & would love a book that focuses on different monsters (zombie, vampire...) from histor/cult perspective. I've used (& enjoyed!) Asma's On Monsters and Poole's Monsters in America, but both are a bit dated by now. Thoughts?
October 24, 2025 at 6:44 PM
Hoping for some academic help...updating my readings in a Monsters class & would love a book that focuses on different monsters (zombie, vampire...) from histor/cult perspective. I've used (& enjoyed!) Asma's On Monsters and Poole's Monsters in America, but both are a bit dated by now. Thoughts?
Reposted by Brian Leech
Perhaps now you will understand the risks involved when you "hang it in the Louvre."
October 19, 2025 at 4:16 PM
Perhaps now you will understand the risks involved when you "hang it in the Louvre."
Reposted by Brian Leech
There’s a lot of impressive Halloween decorations by us, but this house always has the best topical/pop culture references
The Coldplay scandal looks even better as skeletons
The Coldplay scandal looks even better as skeletons
October 11, 2025 at 4:39 PM
There’s a lot of impressive Halloween decorations by us, but this house always has the best topical/pop culture references
The Coldplay scandal looks even better as skeletons
The Coldplay scandal looks even better as skeletons
Reposted by Brian Leech
And here we go. I never wrote this article, and yet it is cited here.
www.liberalbriefs.com/geopolitics/...
And of course, it sounds so plausible, I seriously checked whether I had forgotten it, or the footnote was slightly wrong.
#AIisnotresearch
www.liberalbriefs.com/geopolitics/...
And of course, it sounds so plausible, I seriously checked whether I had forgotten it, or the footnote was slightly wrong.
#AIisnotresearch
October 7, 2025 at 8:17 AM
And here we go. I never wrote this article, and yet it is cited here.
www.liberalbriefs.com/geopolitics/...
And of course, it sounds so plausible, I seriously checked whether I had forgotten it, or the footnote was slightly wrong.
#AIisnotresearch
www.liberalbriefs.com/geopolitics/...
And of course, it sounds so plausible, I seriously checked whether I had forgotten it, or the footnote was slightly wrong.
#AIisnotresearch
Please join the Energy History Working Group online through the CHSTM. Our 2025-26 schedule starts October 10 with Blessy Abraham, ‘No Soviet Petrol Used’: Examining the Standard Oil-Shell Rivalry in India, 1927-28. www.chstm.org/group/energy... @sarahthestan.bsky.social @rlifset.bsky.social
Energy History | Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine
www.chstm.org
October 7, 2025 at 10:28 PM
Please join the Energy History Working Group online through the CHSTM. Our 2025-26 schedule starts October 10 with Blessy Abraham, ‘No Soviet Petrol Used’: Examining the Standard Oil-Shell Rivalry in India, 1927-28. www.chstm.org/group/energy... @sarahthestan.bsky.social @rlifset.bsky.social
Reposted by Brian Leech
If you've done in-person research at any of the following presidential libraries in the last 8 months, can you please follow me/contact me—soon—for a story I'm working on (can be off the record)?
Hoover
FDR
Truman
Eisenhower
JFK
LBJ
Ford
Carter
And either way, can you please share this request? 🙏
Hoover
FDR
Truman
Eisenhower
JFK
LBJ
Ford
Carter
And either way, can you please share this request? 🙏
September 30, 2025 at 10:52 PM
If you've done in-person research at any of the following presidential libraries in the last 8 months, can you please follow me/contact me—soon—for a story I'm working on (can be off the record)?
Hoover
FDR
Truman
Eisenhower
JFK
LBJ
Ford
Carter
And either way, can you please share this request? 🙏
Hoover
FDR
Truman
Eisenhower
JFK
LBJ
Ford
Carter
And either way, can you please share this request? 🙏
Reposted by Brian Leech
Recommend this really moving piece by @bcgl.bsky.social on the challenging questions raised when representing the past with technologies like AI.
“But what if, instead of resisting the deaths of the last survivors, we allow ourselves to accept their mortality?”
The grandson of an Auschwitz-Birkenau survivor grapples with the use of AI to reanimate the dead.
A new essay on @longreads.com, by @bcgl.bsky.social: longreads.com/2025/09/25/a...
The grandson of an Auschwitz-Birkenau survivor grapples with the use of AI to reanimate the dead.
A new essay on @longreads.com, by @bcgl.bsky.social: longreads.com/2025/09/25/a...
September 25, 2025 at 9:00 PM
Recommend this really moving piece by @bcgl.bsky.social on the challenging questions raised when representing the past with technologies like AI.
I guess my college no longer has access to an online meeting platform that can record a meeting. Sigh.
September 25, 2025 at 3:44 AM
I guess my college no longer has access to an online meeting platform that can record a meeting. Sigh.
I guess my college no longer provides access to a video meeting service that can record a meeting. Sigh.
September 25, 2025 at 2:28 AM
I guess my college no longer provides access to a video meeting service that can record a meeting. Sigh.
Reposted by Brian Leech
NJ PBS shutting down next summer.
“15yrs ago Gov. Christie ended 4 decades of state funding for public TV, forcing them to find a new funder. The state cut $750k in funding this yr, but that was hardly the fatal blow; that came from the end of federal funds.”
newjerseyglobe.com/media/new-je...
“15yrs ago Gov. Christie ended 4 decades of state funding for public TV, forcing them to find a new funder. The state cut $750k in funding this yr, but that was hardly the fatal blow; that came from the end of federal funds.”
newjerseyglobe.com/media/new-je...
New Jersey PBS shutting down in July - New Jersey Globe
New Jersey PBS is expected to cease operations in July 2026 following WNET's decision not to renew its agreement, the New Jersey Globe has learned. The
newjerseyglobe.com
September 23, 2025 at 11:31 PM
NJ PBS shutting down next summer.
“15yrs ago Gov. Christie ended 4 decades of state funding for public TV, forcing them to find a new funder. The state cut $750k in funding this yr, but that was hardly the fatal blow; that came from the end of federal funds.”
newjerseyglobe.com/media/new-je...
“15yrs ago Gov. Christie ended 4 decades of state funding for public TV, forcing them to find a new funder. The state cut $750k in funding this yr, but that was hardly the fatal blow; that came from the end of federal funds.”
newjerseyglobe.com/media/new-je...
I have been on the search for some sandals that can handle midwestern snow storms.
September 24, 2025 at 2:19 AM
I have been on the search for some sandals that can handle midwestern snow storms.
Reposted by Brian Leech
"Oxford becomes first UK university to offer ChatGPT Edu to all staff and students" - imagining a lot of staff there pretty upset about, but also it says much about OpenAI's education strategy that it's targeted Oxford as its first institutional capture in the UK www.ox.ac.uk/news/2025-09...
Oxford becomes first UK university to offer ChatGPT Edu to all staff
OpenAI’s flagship GPT-5 model will be provided across the University and Oxford Colleges through ChatGPT Edu, a version of ChatGPT built for universities that includes enterprise-level security and
www.ox.ac.uk
September 19, 2025 at 12:26 PM
"Oxford becomes first UK university to offer ChatGPT Edu to all staff and students" - imagining a lot of staff there pretty upset about, but also it says much about OpenAI's education strategy that it's targeted Oxford as its first institutional capture in the UK www.ox.ac.uk/news/2025-09...
Reposted by Brian Leech
TFW you're ready to start the 2nd half U.S. history lecture that covers Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" & the creation of the FDA when the students tell you there are free hot dogs in the atrium for Constitution Day & you know you're about to ruin their free lunch for them... 🗃️
a woman in a plaid shirt is making a funny face and says oopsssiess .
Alt: Eleanor from The Good Place in a plaid shirt is making a funny face and says oopsssiess .
media.tenor.com
September 17, 2025 at 10:40 PM
TFW you're ready to start the 2nd half U.S. history lecture that covers Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" & the creation of the FDA when the students tell you there are free hot dogs in the atrium for Constitution Day & you know you're about to ruin their free lunch for them... 🗃️
Reposted by Brian Leech
For those who are interested my university had a viral moment yesterday due to the conservative social media mob. My school put out a statement to explain the misunderstanding: ung.edu/news/article...
Statement on concerns about textbook
ung.edu
September 17, 2025 at 6:15 PM
For those who are interested my university had a viral moment yesterday due to the conservative social media mob. My school put out a statement to explain the misunderstanding: ung.edu/news/article...
Reposted by Brian Leech
I'm sorry, worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable permission to my voice and likeness? For what now? In any manner for any purpose???
This is in academia/.edu's new ToS, which you're prompted to agree to on login. Anyway I'll be jumping ship. You can find my stuff at hcommons.org.
This is in academia/.edu's new ToS, which you're prompted to agree to on login. Anyway I'll be jumping ship. You can find my stuff at hcommons.org.
September 17, 2025 at 5:16 PM
I'm sorry, worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable permission to my voice and likeness? For what now? In any manner for any purpose???
This is in academia/.edu's new ToS, which you're prompted to agree to on login. Anyway I'll be jumping ship. You can find my stuff at hcommons.org.
This is in academia/.edu's new ToS, which you're prompted to agree to on login. Anyway I'll be jumping ship. You can find my stuff at hcommons.org.