Dr. William (Curt) Lowe
Dr. William (Curt) Lowe, Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, recently had 19 articles published in the new Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
Most of Lowe's articles are written about influential people in the 18th century. His persons of study range from Lord Ravensworth, a member of the House of Lords, to the Second Earl of Dunnmore, a Scottish noble, to Sir Jeffrey Amherst, a major military figure.
Although Lowe was able to use information from his doctoral dissertation for his articles, he still made many trips to find additional information for the articles. Lowe traveled to Madison, WI, Iowa City, IA and even to the Library of Virginia in Richmond, VA in search of information about his subjects. It took him four years to research and write the articles.
Lowe, a member of the North American Conference of British Studies, received a letter in the mail, inviting him to update or write new articles for the Dictionary of National Biography. "I was very pleased to be invited to be a part of the new version (of the biography)," he said. Letters of invitation were sent all over the world to scholars in British studies.
The Dictionary of National Biography was first published in 1901 with addenda being released every decade, recording notable figures who had died. However, for the past 12 years, the Oxford Press has been updating the original Dictionary of National Biography by releasing the new Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. The updated version now contains more than 50,000 biographies written by 10,000 contributors. It is available both in a print edition of 60 volumes and by an online subscription.
The list price of the printed version is $13,000.00, according to the Oxford University Press website. The online edition is available to individuals with two subscription plans: monthly option at $29.95 a month or annual subscription at $295.00.