About

I am many things, but first and foremost a writer and passionate women’s historian who loves sharing women’s stories and ensuring their place in history. As an associate professor and chair of the Humanities Department at Merrimack College, my research centers on women’s entrepreneurship since World War II, exploring the forces that have made business ownership increasingly attractive to women. I am especially interested in women’s goals in starting ventures, the impact of their personal and professional experiences in this decision, the role of access to credit in launching and growing businesses, how women’s business ownership has shaped society, and whether business can be a tool for social change – all of which I explore in my book, She’s the Boss: The Rise of Women’s Entrepreneurship since World War II (Rutgers, 2025). My essays have also been featured in The Business of Emotions in Modern History (Bloomsbury, 2023) and Feminist Fathers, Fathering Feminists (Demeter Press, 2020), and Imagine Nation: The American Counterculture of the 1960s and ‘70s (Routledge, 2001). I have additionally served as a consultant to the online National Women’s History Museum (womenshistory.org), where I coauthored an exhibit on 100 years of women’s entrepreneurial history. In 2016 was invited to serve consultant/member of the scholar working group assisting the Congressional Commission for the proposed American Museum of Women’s History in Washington, D.C. Before becoming an historian, I was a journalist, publishing in BusinessWeek, Women’s Wear Daily, Ms., Working Woman, the Smith Alumnae Quarterly, and the New York Daily News.