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FrontPage Magazine | Ronald Radosh — The Triumph of Ideological History ; February 1, 2002

http://frontpagemag.com/columnists/radosh/2002/rr02-01-02.htm

Excerpts from article:
“…now a much more serious crisis has emerged in the land of academic historians. This one has graver implications, and reflects not only on the personal drama surrounding Emory University
professor Michael A. Bellesiles, but on the nature of the crisis surrounding the field of academic history itself. Bellesiles, as readers of this site most probably are already aware, is the author of Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Cult (Knopf,2000). His thesis, quite simply, is that the belief that early America was heavily armed is nothing but a great myth. Gun ownership was actually exceptional, Bellesiles argued. Most available guns didn?t work, and one could not find gunsmiths easily who could fix them. The evolution of a ?gun culture,? he argued, was something that arose only after the Civil War.”

“Then, however, some non-partisan historians and other scholars began to look over his book. Northwestern University professor of Law James Lindgren, whose work involved use of probate records and quantitative data, revealed what he said were major serious errors in Bellesiles? book. His use of probate records, Lindgren determined, was internally inconsistent and mathematically impossible. Moreover, records that Bellesiles said he had examined simply did not exist. Bellesiles had said he had read probate inventories at a National Archives Center in East Point, Georgia. The center told Lindgren they had no such archives. This was just the beginning.”