Happy 7th Birthday (+ 1 week) to RiAH!

Paul Harvey

Hey, a week ago today was the 7th birthday for this blog, and the fact that I forgot about it entirely should give you youngsters a little clue about life in your 50s. Wait, where are my glasses? It's true that this blog began as a self-promotional lark, but somehow it has grown into a wonderfully enriching professional community, and my thanks to all who have been a part of that.

So, happy birthday to us! (and happy 6th birthday as well to John Fea's blog, the first-born child of our blog here). We have some changes ongoing right now which will be fully implemented in the fall. As you can see from our masthead, Cara Burnidge (just named a new assistant professor at University of Northern Iowa !!!!) and Michael Hammond are moving into the roles of co-blogmeisters, while I settle into the balcony chairs of Statler and Waldorf. My thanks to Cara and Michael for transitioning the blog into a new era, while I just try to remember where I put my keys and my glasses.

As you have seen as well, we have a couple of new bloggers coming on board. For those interested in writing for the blog, please contact Cara and let her know your interests. Our facebook and twitter followings have both exceeded 1,500 and are going strong, and my thanks to our team of social media gurus for keeping that going -- that would be Carol Faulkner and Trevor Burrows on the facebook side, and Paul Putz and Michael Hammond on the Twitter side.

I'll stick around for a few months for the transition, but hope to be settled into my retirement home sometime this fall. Until then, thanks for reading, blogging, commenting, facebooking and tweeting our posts. And for those who wish to write directly to me, please do so in large print.

Comments

Kathryn Lofton said…
Paul, with typical Okie shyness, you have wholly understated your Blogmeister retirement. So we're going to have to do something that celebrates you more loudly and obnoxiously. Through RiAH, you have created an incomparable bibliographic resource, professional bulletin board, annotated archive, and nerd survival handbook for our field. Gratitude will need to occur in regular intervals over the next several months. Meanwhile, kudos to Cara, and thanks to her and Michael for continuing this space for us all to learn from and enjoy.
Go team! (Paul, thanks for all that you do.)
Michael Hammond said…
Paul--your contribution to the field of religion in American history is not limited to this site, but it is worth noting that over the past seven years the site has attracted over 1,688,500 page views. Don't take your talents to South Beach just yet...we will look forward to your future contributions.
And all--It seems appropriate to produce a "blogmeister-festschrift" (blogschrift?) in honor of Paul this fall. Stay tuned!

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