Congratulations Abdul!!!! I can’t believe I know a Democratic nominee for Senate! Or that this picture was 11 years ago. The idea of Abdul being in the Senate advocating for public health and access to health care, especially at a time when RFKJ is in charge at HHS, is incredible to contemplate.

Kathleen Bachynski@bachynski.bsky.social · last mo.

I don’t exactly have the power of an AOC endorsement, but I’ve known Abdul for quite some time and I would be thrilled to see him represent public health in the Senate. He was our class speaker when I graduated from undergrad (Go Blue!) and then I got to know him better when were both at Columbia.

If Abdul El-Sayed wins the primary in Michigan today and goes on to win in November, he will be the first Democratic Senator to hold and medical degree and be a public health expert since Sen. Royal Copeland (former NYC health commissioner) died in 1938.

If Abdul El-Sayed wins the primary in Michigan today and goes on to win in November, he will be the first Democratic Senator to hold and medical degree and be a public health expert since Sen. Royal Copeland (former NYC health commissioner) died in 1938.

Glad to see my friend and former Marietta College colleague standing up against the terrible damage fracking is causing in Southeast Ohio. I can’t tell you how many times I was gaslit when I lived there about how safe it was. www.nytimes.com/2026/07/29/c...

In Ohio, Toxic Wastewater Is Bubbling Up Out of the Ground (Gift Article)

The state is a major importer of fracking wastewater, which gets pumped underground but doesn’t always stay there. The city of Marietta is fighting back.

nytimes.com

Sprite saved us all from an invasion this morning. Our little hero…

This is an incredible idea.

Anna O. Law@unlawfulentries.bsky.social · last wk.

Academic authors: For a fee, I will read your book on the NYC subway looking very engrossed. Extra for if you want me to point, and say very loudly, "THIS is what I'm talking about!"

Conservatives in 2016: TRIGGERED LIB???? Conservatives in 2026: We are installing trigger warnings in the Smithsonian

Amazingly, this is not a unique experience! “In 2003, a librarian in New Mexico opened a book and an envelope containing lesion crusts fell out of the book (Figure 3, panel C). The envelope was labeled “scabs from vaccination of W.B. Yarrington’s children,” and the book was dated 1888.”

Poxvirus Viability and Signatures in Historical Relics

Poxvirus Viability and Signatures in Relics

wwwnc.cdc.gov

Ada Palmer@adapalmer.bsky.social · 2w ago

Historian friend was reading a civil war era letter in an archive, the letter said “In this envelope I include my smallpox scabs” and sure enough there they were. Had to call CDC for a hazmat team.

YIKES! I always had this worry when doing my research but fortunately never ran into anything like this. I did question how I should be handling doctors’ notebooks from a smallpox hospital that looked like they hadn’t been opened in centuries, but luckily no scabs.

Ada Palmer@adapalmer.bsky.social · 2w ago

Historian friend was reading a civil war era letter in an archive, the letter said “In this envelope I include my smallpox scabs” and sure enough there they were. Had to call CDC for a hazmat team.

Probably more helpful to think of them not so much as “Canadian wildfires” but rather “climate change wildfires currently consuming Canada”

Sprite has announced that this game is over and it’s time for *him to play ball.

Enjoy fireworks on the 4th? Thank vaccines for making this (still dangerous) activity safer! Before routine vaccination for tetanus in the 1940s, the patriotic spirit every 4th of July was muted shortly thereafter when newspapers reported deaths from lockjaw (aka tetanus) in the days that followed.

Much is made of the 27 grievances in the Declaration and how some of them are thin or contrived. It’s really a wonder that blaming the King for spreading smallpox among them. It was widely thought that the British army was purposely trying to infect both the Continental Army and the American people🧵

"Cotton Tufts"

Andrew Wehrman@profwehrman.bsky.social · last mo.

Today is the 250th anniversary of Boston’s mass inoculation against smallpox on July 3, 1776. The city was effectively closed to commerce from July through September 1776. The mass immunization effort was cheered as evidence of true independence. Here's how I described it in my book:

Today is the 250th anniversary of Boston’s mass inoculation against smallpox on July 3, 1776. The city was effectively closed to commerce from July through September 1776. The mass immunization effort was cheered as evidence of true independence. Here's how I described it in my book:

I’m with my son at the orthodontist and they have a “fun fact” slideshow about teeth in the waiting room. One of the facts is that George Washington had wooden teeth. I’m currently doing my best to suppress my historian rage. We’ll see if it lasts.

An open letter, to readers, about Charity and Sylvia. I am very pained to feel the need to write this. #queerhistory #pride

I very much endorse pretending to read my book while lying in a hammock. Thanks, Library of Virginia!

I showed this with a shocked face to my wife (who is not a soccer fan), and she too looked shocked and said “how did they get half a goal?!”

Here’s a police dog that I saw in France. There’s no need for police dogs to be intimidating if their job is just to smell.

I was happy to see these large banners in Lyon commemorating the lives of historians Marc Bloch and Simonne Vidal in Lyon this week.

Alex Ford@apf102.bsky.social · 2mo ago

This feels apt on the day we commemorate the death of Marc Bloch. It’s a reminder that we must never let govts (or indeed schools) teach one historical story. The critical method has to be central to school history so young people have agency to critique the present and shape the future. #marcbloch

Currently in France and wondering if these are lawyers for octopi or indeed octopus lawyers.

I’m saddened to hear the news of the great historian Gordon Wood. I got into grad school in part based on bashing his “Radicalism” in my cover letter, but I was fortunate enough to have dinner with him a couple of times and he was lovely and supportive of my scholarship. Truly a loss of a giant.

Celebrate #America250 the way that Abigail Adams celebrated July 4, 1776: participate in a public-health campaign against infectious diseases.

Hopkins Press@hopkinspress.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Andrew Wehrman, author of "The Contagion of Liberty," joins GBH's 'Morning Edition' to discuss the battle of smallpox that was fought alongside the American Revolution, 250 years ago. 😷 Listen to the piece using the link below! 🎧

“It’s difficult to apply history to modern day; most scenarios are deeply nuanced, with too many extraneous factors to allow for a fair equivalence. Even so, Boston’s early public health system relied on an essential ingredient lacking today: trust.”

Andrew Wehrman@profwehrman.bsky.social · 2mo ago

I’m happy to have had my research featured in this piece for @wgbh.org! It’s a short version of the arguments I made in my book, namely that revolutionary Americans understood their government had a duty to protect them from epidemic disease. www.wgbh.org/news/local/2...

I’m happy to have had my research featured in this piece for @wgbh.org! It’s a short version of the arguments I made in my book, namely that revolutionary Americans understood their government had a duty to protect them from epidemic disease. www.wgbh.org/news/local/2...

The other enemy America was fighting 250 years ago: Smallpox

As smallpox spread, colonists equated public health with self-governance, demanding that local officials track outbreaks and protect the public from contagion.

wgbh.org

Someone is upset that he’s not coming on our upcoming trip…

You’re probably asking in this 250th anniversary of 1776: “how did Americans in the Revolutionary era handle people who tried to leave quarantine early?” Well, in 1774, sailors in Mass. threatened to kill patients who broke quarantine rules and later burned the hospital that allowed early exits.

American Passenger Blocked From Leaving Federal Hantavirus Quarantine

nytimes.com

My wife has been painting bricks for our garden to look like classic books. Here are a couple of favorites:

Yes! Like building hospitals and inoculating the public for one.

Gautham Rao (pronounced: Knicks in 5)@gauthamrao.bsky.social · 3mo ago

A wildly under appreciated legacy of the American Revolution (due to consensus historians, but that's its own story...) is patriots wanted a state to do the public things they wanted.