New Indiana County Historian Appointed in Monroe County

The Indiana Historical Society is excited to announce that a new Indiana county historian has been appointed in Monroe County.

New Monroe County historian David Nord is professor emeritus of journalism and adjunct professor emeritus of history at Indiana University–Bloomington. He is a former interim editor and associate editor of the Journal of American History.

Nord did his undergraduate work at Valparaiso University, and he completed the M.A. in history at the University of Minnesota and the Ph.D. in mass communication research at the University of Wisconsin. He came to Indiana University in 1979 and retired in 2012.

In retirement, as a volunteer historian for Spring Mill State Park, he developed an interest in the economic history of southern Indiana. He has explored the history of river, road, and rail transportation in the decades before the Civil War and the history of flour milling in Indiana, 1820–1920. He has also compiled illustrated and annotated bibliographies of the historic maps of Lawrence County and Monroe County, Indiana.

He is the author of Faith in Reading: Religious Publishing and the Birth of Mass Media in America (New York, 2004); and Communities of Journalism: A History of American Newspapers and Their Readers (Urbana, Ill., 2001). In retirement, he has been exploring Indiana local history. His recent projects include: Mapping Monroe County, Indiana: An Annotated Bibliography, 1815–1941 (Bloomington, 2021); Mapping Lawrence County, Indiana: An Annotated Bibliography, 1818–1941 (Bedford, 2018); and Rivers, Roads, and Rails: A Transportation History of Spring Mill Village (Bedford, 2024). He has also recently published articles on Indiana history in Traces magazine and the Indiana Magazine of History.

In 1981, through an effort to improve the historical communication network in the state, the Indiana Historical Society and the Indiana Historical Bureau established the Indiana County Historian Program. County historians serve as volunteers appointed by the Indiana Historical Society and Indiana Historical Bureau to promote local history in their counties, connect individuals and groups with history resources, promote collaboration between local history organizations and maintain connections with the Indiana Historical Society and Indiana Historical Bureau.

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