LESLIE WOODCOCK TENTLER
Department of History
The Catholic University of America
Washington, DC 20064
tentler@cua.edu
Home address: 211 13th St., S.E.
Washington, DC 20003
Education: Ph.D., University of Michigan, 1975
A.B., University of Michigan, 1967
Employment: University of Michigan-Dearborn:
Instructor in history, 1973-1975
Assistant professor of history, 1976-1980
Associate professor of history, 1980-1988
Professor of history, 1988-1998
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor:
Visiting associate professor of history, winter 1983
Visiting professor of history, winter 1990
The Catholic University of America:
Ordinary professor of history, 1998-
PUBLICATIONS
BOOKS
Catholics and Contraception: An American History (Cornell University Press, 2004)
Seasons of Grace: A History of the Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1990)
Wage-Earning Women: Industrial Employment and Family Life in the United States, 1900-1930 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979)
ARTICLES AND ESSAYS
“Forum: American Religion and Class,” Religion and American Culture 15:1 forthcoming, Winter 2005
“A Bitter Pill: American Catholics and Contraception,” Commonweal, CXXXI:8, 23 April 2004 and “Continuing the Conversation: Humanae Vitae’s Legacy,” Commonweal CXXXI:11, 4 June 2004
“’The Abominable Crime of Onan:’ Catholic Pastoral Practice and Family Limitation, 1875-1919,” Church History, 71:2, June 2002.
“’God’s Representative in Our Midst’: Toward a History of the Catholic Diocesan Clergy in the United States,” Church History 67:2, June 1998
“Reluctant Pluralists: Catholic and Reformed Clergy in Ante-Bellum Michigan,” U.S. Catholic Historian 15:2, Spring 1997
“Present at the Creation: Working-Class Catholics in the United States,” in Rick Halpern and Jonathan Morris, eds., American Exceptionalism? U.S. Working Class Formation in an International Context (London: Macmillan, 1997)
“One Historian’s Sundays,” in Bruce Kuklick and D.G. Hart, eds., Religious Advocacy and American History (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1997)
“’How I Would Save Them All’: Priests on the Michigan Frontier,” U.S. Catholic Historian 12:4, Fall 1994
“On the Margins: The State of American Catholic History,” American Quarterly 45:1, March 1993
“’A Model Rural Parish’: Priests and People in the Michigan ‘Thumb,’ 1923-1928,” The Catholic Historical Review 78:3, July 1992
“The Debt That Binds Us: A Historian’s Perspective on the Research Uses of Clergy Personnel Records,” in Frederick J. Stielow et al, eds., Two Hundred Years of Catholic Record Keeping in America: Issues and Responsibilities (Chicago: Association of Catholic Diocesan Archivists, 1990)
“’I’m Not Literary, Dear’: George Orwell on Women and the Family,” in Ejner Jensen, ed., The Future of Nineteen Eighty-Four (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1984)
“Who is the Church? Conflict in a Polish Immigrant Parish in Late Nineteenth-Century Detroit,” Comparative Studies in Society and History, April 1983. Reprinted in Timothy J. Meagher, ed., Urban American Catholicism: The Culture and Identity of the American Catholic People (New York: Garland Publishing, 1988)
CONTRIBUTIONS TO REFERENCE WORKS
“Gabriel Richard,” “Frederic Rese,” “Peter Paul Lefevere,” all in John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, eds., American National Biography (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999; 24 volumes)
IN-HOUSE PUBLICATIONS
“God and the City: Religion in the Context of Urban History,” in Ted-Larry Pebworth and Claude Summers, eds., Connections: Faculty Voices (Dearborn, MI: University of Michigan-Dearborn, 1993)
BOOK REVIEWS AND REVIEW ESSAYS
In various issues of the American Historical Review, Catholic Historical Review, Church History, Horizons: the Journal of the College Theology Society, Journal of the Historical Society, Labor History, Michigan Historical Review, U.S. Catholic Historian, Journal of Religious History, Journal of Southern History, American Jewish History, Religion and American Culture, Books and Culture, Washington Post Book World, and on H-Net.
PAPERS
“Historical Research and Clergy Personnel Records,” keynote address, Association of Catholic Diocesan Archivists Biennial Conference, University of St. Mary of the Lake, Mundelein, IL, 23 July 2004
“Catholic Women and the Teaching on Birth Control, 1945-1968,” University of Dayton, 24 March 2004.
“Speaking of Marriage: The Laity and the Debate Over Contraception,” delivered at a symposium on “Leonard Bernstein’s Mass and American Society, 1960-1971”, The Catholic University of America, 2 April 2003.
“’It Isn’t Easy To Be a Catholic’: Religious Identity and the Church’s Teaching on Contraception, 1945-1968,” American Catholic Historical Association, Chicago, 5 Jan. 2003
“Ecclesia Semper Reformanda: John Cardinal Dearden and the Papal Encyclical on Birth Control, 1968,” Marygrove College, Detroit: “Defining Detroit” lecture series, 18 Jan. 2001.
“Sexual Politics: Contraception and Authority in the Catholic 1960s,” American Society of Church History/American Catholic Historical Association, Boston, 5 Jan. 2001.
“Swimming Against the Current: American Catholics and Birth Control in the 1920s,” University of Notre Dame, Department of History, 16 Nov. 2000
“Catholic Identity and the Debate over Contraception, 1919-1960,” American Studies Association annual meeting, Detroit, 14 Oct. 2000
“Catholics, Contraception and Sexual Sin, 1900-1945,” Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, University of Notre Dame, 22 Oct. 1999
“’An Extremely Delicate Question’: Catholic Priests and the Birth Control Controversy,” The Catholic Daughters of America Lecture, The Catholic University of America, 9 April 1999
“Confession on the Great Lakes Frontier: Problems of Language and Culture,” American Catholic Historical Association annual meeting, Seattle, 11 Jan. 1998
“Spirituality and Sin: Documenting the Intangibles of Religious History,” Midwest Archives Conference, St. Louis, 17 Oct. 1997
“Mrs. Adderley’s Featherbed: Towards a History of the Catholic Diocesan Clergy in the United States,” Department of History, Fordham University, 4 April 1997
“Talking to Ourselves: Belief and the Writing of Religious History,” banquet address, American Catholic Historical Association spring meeting, Marquette University, 7 April 1995
“Present at the Creation: Working-Class Catholics in the United States,” Commonwealth Fund Conference on American History, University College, London, 17-18 February 1995
“Priest and People: Revisiting the History of the Diocesan Clergy.” Conference: Anamnesis: Re-Presenting the History of American Catholics, Center for the Study of American Religion, Princeton University, 17-18 June 1994.
“One Historian’s Sundays,” contribution to a consultation on “The Problem of Advocacy in the Writing of American History,” Center for the Study of American Evangelicals, Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL, 28-30 April 1994
“Who is the Church? Writing the History of Catholic Detroit,” Michigan in Perspective: 34th Annual Conference on Local History, Wayne State University, Detroit, 10 April 1992
“Handing On What We Have Received: Church History in Local Context,” Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, 29 February 1992
“Creating the City: Religion in the Context of Urban History,” Department of History, Wayne State University, Detroit, 29 January 1992
“All Church History is Local: Historians and Parish Records,” Midwest Archives Conference, Chicago, 10 May 1991
“The Debt That Binds Us: A Historian’s Perspective on the Research Uses of Clergy Personnel Records,” University of St. Mary of the Lake, Mundelein, IL, 30 July 1989
“Towards a Comparative Episcopal History? The View from Detroit,” joint session, American Historical Association/American Catholic Historical Association, Cincinnati, 30 Dec. 1988
“Religion or Archives: What Comes First for the Religious Archivist?” Midwest Archives Conference, Chicago, 6 May 1988
“Is There a Future for ‘Official’ Diocesan History?” American Catholic Historical Association, Providence College, 11 April 1987
“’Religious Action to Accord with the Age’: Catholic Women’s Organizations in Detroit, 1890-1918,” joint session, American Historical Association/American Catholic Historical Association, Chicago, 29 Dec. 1986
“Catholic Women and their Church: A View from Detroit,” American Catholic Studies Seminar, University of Notre Dame, 12 Nov. 1985. Included in the “Working Papers” series distributed by the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, Series 16, No. 2, Fall 1985.
“Professional Historians and Diocesan Histories,” Conference of Catholic diocesan archivists in the United States and Canada, St. John’s Provincial Seminary, Plymouth MI, 13 June 1984
“Church History: The Perspective from the Diocese,” contribution to “Church History: Retrospect and Prospect,” Bentley Library, Michigan Historical Collections, Ann Arbor, 18 Nov. 1983.
“Another Side of George Orwell: Women and the Family in His Fiction and Journalism,” contribution to “The Future of Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Conference,” University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 12 March 1983
“Women in the Immigrant Church,” Women’s Studies Program, Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti MI, 9 March 1983
“Reflections on Women in the Immigrant Church: The Case of Poles in Detroit,” Gender Studies Lecture Series, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 8 April 1982
“Occupational Segregation and the Female Work Experience, 1900-1930,” Third Annual Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Bryn Mawr College, 10 June 1976
PRESENTATIONS AS PANELIST AND COMMENTATOR
Invited participant, “Toward an Ecclesial Professional Ethic,” Boston College, the Church in the 21st Century project, 13-14 Feb. 2004.
Commentator, panel on “Writing Catholic Women’s History,” American Catholic Historical Association, Washington, DC, 8 Jan. 2004.
Commentator, “Faith and History: Catholic Perspectives,” symposium at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 30-31 March 2001.
Panelist, symposium on Bruce Nelson’s Divided We Stand: American Workers and the Struggle for Black Equality, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C., 9 Feb. 2001.
Panelist, “The ‘Christian Scholar’ in Secular America: The Work of George Marsden,” American Academy of Religion, Nashville, TN, 20 Nov. 2000
Commentator, panel on “The History of Catholic Civil Engagement in the United States,” American Catholics in the Public Square: Joint Consultation, Commonweal Foundation and Faith & Reason Institute. Annapolis, MD, 2 June 2000
Commentator, panel on “The Love of Learning and the Desire for God: Scholarly Priests in the United States,” American Catholic Historical Association Spring Meetings, Cabrini College/Villanova University, 19 March 1999
Commentator, panel on “Immigration, Religion and the Politics of Citizenship: The American North, 1820-1930,” American Historical Association, Washington DC, 8 Jan. 1999
Commentator, panel on “Religion, Company Unions, and Union-Building in Depression-Era Steel Towns,” North American Labor History Conference, Wayne State University, 25 Oct. 1997
Panelist, “American Catholic History: Critical Reflections,” symposium in honor of Philip Gleason, University of Notre Dame, 25 April 1997
Chair and commentator, panel on “Labor Priests and the American Working Class, 1935-1960,” North American Labor History Conference, Wayne State University, 18 Oct. 1996.
Panelist, “Writing Church History,” founding meeting, Historical Society of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan, St. Luke’s Church, Ypsilanti, MI, 7 Oct. 1995
Facilitator, seminar on “Gender and the Construction of Catholic Memory.” Conference: En-gendering American Catholicism, Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, University of Notre Dame, 29 Sept.-1 Oct. 1995
Panelist, “Future Issues in Chicago Catholic History.” Conference: Chicago and the American Catholic Experience, Loyola University, Chicago, 5 Nov. 1994
Commentator, panel on “Women in the New World: Scholars and Evangelizers.” Conference on the history of Christianity, jointly sponsored by the American Society for Church History and the American Catholic Historical Association, University of Notre Dame, 27 March 1992
Respondent, symposium on Leslie Woodcock Tentler, Seasons of Grace: A History of the Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit. Rackham School of Graduate Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 19 November 1990
Commentator, panel on “Devotionalism in the Twentieth Century.” Conference: American Catholicism in the Twentieth Century, University of Notre Dame, 3 Nov. 1990
Commentator, panel on “New Directions in American Catholic History,” Organization of American Historians annual meeting, Washington D.C., 24 March 1990
Commentator, panel on “Catholicism and American Culture,” Great Lakes American Studies Association, University of Notre Dame, 5 Oct. 1985
Commentator, panel on “Chautauqua, Bible Schools and the Kingdom of God in America.” Conference: American Culture and the Chautauqua Era, Henry Ford Museum, Dearborn, MI, 12 May 1984
Commentator, panel on “The Female Role in Social Welfare,” Organization of American Historians annual meeting, Philadelphia, 3 April 1982
Commentator, panel on “Organization of Female Public Employees,” North American Labor History Conference, Wayne State University, Detroit, 10 Oct. 1981
SYMPOSIA/CONFERENCES ORGANIZED
“Catholics and Presidential Politics: 1960 and 2004,” The Catholic University of America, 16 Nov. 2004
“Confession: Historical, Theological and Pastoral Reflections on Changes in the Sacrament of Penance,” The Catholic University of America, 19 March 2004.
“Decline and Fall? Roman Catholicism Since 1950 in the United States, the Republic of Ireland, and Quebec,” The Catholic University of America, 21-22 March 2003.
“The Catholic Vote, 2002,” The Catholic University of America, 12 Nov. 2002
“Priestly Identity in a Time of Crisis: New Research on the Catholic Clergy,” The Catholic University of America, 9 Sept. 2002
“Young Adult Catholics: Gender, Generation and Commitment,” The Catholic University of America, 5 Oct. 2001
RECENT GRANTS
Louisville Institute grant to underwrite “Decline and Fall? Catholicism Since 1950 in the United States, the Republic of Ireland and the Province of Quebec,” a multi-disciplinary conference to be held at Catholic University. August 2001.
Sabbatical grant for the academic year 1998-99, jointly funded by the Eli Lilly Foundation and the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism
COURSES TAUGHT
LECTURE COURSES:
Introductory Survey of American History (post-1865)
American Women’s History
American Labor History
Immigration and Ethnicity in American History
The Family in American History
Religion in American History
The Civil Rights Movement in the United States
Contemporary Christianity: Theology and Social Thought Since 1945
Washington, DC: Symbol and City
SEMINARS:
Introduction to the Study of History
Historical Origins of Feminism
Contemporary Christianity
Religion in American History
American Catholicism
Twentieth-Century Catholicism Through the Novel
American Culture, 1865-1914
Race and Ethnicity in American History
The Civil Rights Movement in the United States
Material Culture and Everyday Life, 1865-1945 (in conjunction with the Henry Ford Museum/Greenfield Village)
American Urban History
Gender in American History
The History of Washington, D.C.
TEAM-TAUGHT COURSES:
The City in History (History/Sociology)
“Detroit Studies” (History/English/Art History/Sociology)
American Culture, 1865-1914 (History/English/Art History)
Western Culture, 1590-1860, UM-D Honors Program (History/Art History)
Museums, Material Culture and the American Past (in conjunction with the Henry Ford Museum/Greenfield Village)
Shaping Population: Fertility, Contraception, Eugenics and Population Policy in Western Europe and the United States, 1870-1970
Catholicism in the United States since 1945 (History/Religious Studies)
The Literature of Race in American Historiography
Devotionalism in U.S. Catholicism, 1850-1970 (History/Church History)
SELECTED SERVICE ACTIVITIES
Delegate. University of Michigan Senate Assembly, 1989-1992
Member. University of Michigan, Senate Assembly Committee on Tenure, 1989-1992
Member. University of Michigan, President’s Advisory Committee on Women’s Issues,
1989-1991
Member. University of Michigan, Board for Student Publications, 1990-1991
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Academic Affairs Advisory Committee,
1990-1992
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Chancellor Search Committee, 1992
Head. University of Michigan-Dearborn, History Discipline, 1993-1998
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Executive Committee, Department of
Social Science, 1993-1998
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, College Committee on Academic
Advising, 1993-1994
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Executive Committee, College of Arts,
Sciences and Letters, 1994-1995
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Provost’s Committee on Teaching and
Learning, 1995-1996
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Committee on Humanities Internships,
1995-1998
Co-chair. University of Michigan-Dearborn, American history search committee,
1995-1996
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, Undergraduate Curriculum Board,
1996-1998
Member. Henry Ford Estate Advisory Committee, 1997-1998
Member. University of Michigan-Dearborn, full professor review committee, 1998
Campus coordinator. Collegium Summer Institute on Faith and Intellectual Life, Catholic University, 1999-
Director. Center for American Catholic Studies, The Catholic University of America, 2001-
Member. Committee on Appointments and Promotion, College of Arts and Science, The Catholic University of America, 2001-2004
Member. Catholic University Archives Advisory Group, 2002-
RECENT HONORS AND AWARDS
James E. Dornan Memorial Teacher of the Year Award, The Catholic University of America, April 2001.
Michigan Association of Governing Boards, Distinguished Faculty Award, April 1998
Distinguished Faculty Research Award, University of Michigan-Dearborn, March 1996
PROFESSIONAL ASSOCIATIONS/ACTIVITIES
American Historical Association
Organization of American Historians
American Catholic Historical Association (member, executive committee, 1995-1998)
Member, editorial board, Michigan Historical Review, 1995-1998
Member, editorial board, U.S. Catholic Historian, 1999-
Member, advisory committee, project on American Catholicism in the Twentieth Century, Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, University of Notre Dame, 1997-2000
Mentor, Collegium’s Summer Institute on Faith and Intellectual Life, Fairfield University, 11-18 June 1999
