At its recent meeting in Miami, the Business History Conference (BHC) honored Philip Scranton for his central role in the success of its journal, Enterprise & Society: The International Journal of Business History. Scranton was the journal’s founding book review editor from 1999 to 2003, and then its editor-in-chief from 2007 to 2014. In between and overlapping he was elected as BHC president-elect in 2001, joining its board of trustees in that capacity, and then serving as president (2002-03), past-president (2003-04), and past president on the board (2005-06). In these varied capacities Scranton also participated deeply in contract negotiations with Enterprise & Society’s publishers. His extensive activities on behalf of Enterprise & Society and the Business History Conference took place concurrently with his service as director of the Hagley Center for the History of Business, Technology, and Society, and as Board of Governors Professor at Rutgers University.
Phillip Scranton and Carol Lockman, Manager, Center for the History of Business, Techonoloy, and Society at Hagley, at the 2015 Business History Conference.
To honor Scranton’s foundational contributions, the BHC’s trustees voted to name the annual award for the best article in Enterprise & Society the Philip Scranton Best Article Prize. Awarded since the journal’s inception, the prize previously has been called the Newcomen Prize and the Oxford Prize after prior funders of the $1,000 award. To recognize support by the journal’s current publisher, henceforth the prize will be described in announcements as “The Philip Scranton Best Article Prize, generously funded by Cambridge University Press.”
“What we have here is a man who has played a central role in the BHC’s growth and development over the past 16 years, especially the vitality of its journal,” Roger Horowitz wrote to the BHC trustees promoting the honor. “His extraordinary efforts working with authors, especially junior, is well known.”
Scranton also was presented with a plaque in the form of a globe on a stand, to note his extensive travels to participate in conferences, seminars, and classes throughout the world. Engraved on the base were his dates of service in the BHC, and the phrase, “A writer’s editor” to acknowledge his detailed attention to those whose work he edited. He was enthusiastically congratulated at the banquet by Carol Lockman, who worked closely with Phil for many years as the Center’s Coordinator and Enterprise & Society managing editor – and who initially proposed naming the best article prize for him.
Roger Horowitz is Director, Center for the History of Business, Technology, and Society at Hagley.