Save the Date! Scholar-Author Neal Pease to Keynote PALA Annual Meeting

Neal Pease, history professor at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, is scheduled to deliver the keynote address at the Annual Meeting & Career Development Day of the Polish American Librarians Association, February 22, 2015 at Dominican University in River Forest, Illinois. A prolific scholar and researcher, Pease specializes in the history of Poland and Central Europe as well as the history of Christianity. A dynamic and provocative speaker, Pease will talk about “Poland’s Turbulent, Tragic, and Triumphant 20th Century: How Librarians Can Help the World Understand.”

Neal Pease has a Ph.D. (1982) and M.A. (1976) in history from Yale University. His undergraduate studies in history were done at the University of Kansas. He studied in Poland at the Uniwersytet Warszawski in Warsaw (1978-79) and the Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza, in Poznań, Poland (1972-73). He is the author of two books: Rome’s Most Faithful Daughter: The Catholic Church and Independent Poland, 1914-1939 (Athens, Ohio University Press, 2009) and Poland, the United States, and the Stabilization of Europe, 1919-1933 (New York and Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1986). He has published some two dozen articles on topics ranging from “Stanley Ketchel, The ‘Michigan Assassin’: The First Polish American Sports Champion” to “Big Game on the South Side: A Milwaukee Baseball Mystery Decoded.” In the last decade alone, Pease has delivered another two dozen papers, most recently “Haunted by the Past: Poland Remembers its Vanished Jews” and “Karski’s Testimony on the Holocaust: Story of a Secret State, ‘Shoah,’ and ‘The Karski Report,’” at the Jan Karski International Conference on Memory and Responsibility, at Loyola University in Chicago in 2014. In 2014, Pease was awarded the Haiman Award by the Polish American Historical Association, “for lifetime contribution to the field of Polish American studies.” He is also the recipient of the
Officer’s Cross, Order of Merit, from the Republic of Poland, and the American Catholic Historical Association’s 2010 John Gilmary Shea Prize for the best book on the history of Catholicism. Fluent in Polish, French, German, Italian, and Latin, he is also Editor in Chief of The Polish Review and Associate editor of Polish American Studies.

“Neal Pease also has the distinction of being a Polish scholar whose ethnic background is not Polish,” said PALA Executive Director Leonard Kniffel in announcing the speaker, “and part of PALA’s mission is to help librarians better represent Polish history and culture to the wider world including but also beyond the Polish community. This is a rare opportunity for PALA members and library school students to hear from an authority whose presentations are accessible, lively, and illuminating.”

Save the date! The PALA Annual Meeting & Career Development Day is free to PALA members and includes a luncheon buffet, discussion and networking sessions, and a tour of the library at Dominican University. Donations of $10 from nonmembers at the door are greatly appreciated. Membership in the Polish American Librarians Association is $25 (regular) and $15 (special). RSVP by e-mail: vpresident@palalib.org or check the PALA website for regular updates, www.palalib.org