EC/ASECS 2010 Conference
The 2010 annual meeting of the East-Central American Society for
Eighteenth-Century Studies, hosted jointly by Duquesne University, the University of Pittsburgh-Greensburg, and Washington
& Jefferson College, will be held at the Omni William Penn Hotel in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on November 4,
5, and 6.
Named after William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, Pittsburgh is well known
for recovering—from the Great Fire of 1845, from the regular flooding of its three rivers, from its 1860s reputation
as “hell with the lid taken off,” and, more recently, from the collapse of its glass and steel industries—repeatedly
coming back from the dead to become an example of economic recovery and appropriate host city for last year’s G-20 Summit.
Therefore, we have chosen the theme of Recovery to give us all an opportunity to recover people, texts, history, and culture
from the mid-seventeenth through the early nineteenth centuries.
The preliminary program is available on this website, as is
the registration form, travel information, and link to the hotel reservation site (our conference rate of $129 plus tax is
good through 8 October).
The registration fee is $160; those listed in the program as speakers,
chairs, or roundtable participants must be members of the society. They must also register for the conference by 22 October or risk being dropped from the program. Participants without
U.S. checking accounts may pay in cash at the start of the conference but should nevertheless register as soon as possible.
Our conference hotel was built in 1916 by industrialist Henry Clay
Frick to provide a home-away-from-home for millionaires visiting Pittsburgh. The brick building is famous for being the place
where Lawrence Welk acquired the sobriquet of “the champagne music maker” while playing a gig there (the hotel
still has the bubble machine), and it possesses one of the most beautiful hotel lobbies you will ever encounter.
The immediate area was once the center of Pittsburgh’s industrial
heritage and a showcase for its products. From the Grant Street entrance of the hotel, you face the U.S. Steel (USX) Tower
(1960), a three-sided skyscraper of oxidized Cor-ten steel. From the William Penn Place main entrance, you see the Alcoa Building
(1953), its aluminum curtain walls still shiny, and, in the distance, the reflective towers and spires of PPG Place (1981),
global headquarters of the company formerly named Pittsburgh Plate Glass.
The conference and registration table will open Thursday evening
on the Conference Level (CL). The first session commences at 5:45 pm, immediately followed by a reception/cash bar and the
Oral/Aural Experience. This year, Peter Staffel promises us a cut-down (and cut-rate) production of Royall Tyler’s The
Contrast, the first play by a citizen of the United States to receive a professional production (John Street Theatre,
New York, on 16 April 1787). The comic triangle involving Maria van Rough, Henry Manly, and Billy Dimple is well known to
those who teach American literature surveys and will bring to mind The School for Scandal.
Friday offers a plethora of stimulating panels, roundtables, and
coffee-break conversation as well as a continental breakfast and a buffet lunch. The day’s climax will be a plenary
address by David A. Brewer of The Ohio State University, author of The Afterlife of Character, 1726–1825 (University
of Pennsylvania Press, 2005). His talk “The Literary Uses of Authorial Names” will be followed by a cash bar. Saturday
will feature more of the same punctuated by the Business Lunch and the Presidential Address. Evenings will be kept free so
all can explore the culinary and cultural delights of Pittsburgh.
The hotel has excellent restaurants and, within walking distance,
one can find Korean, French, Italian, and Indian food as well as steaks and other American delicacies. For those on a budget
or who want an echt Burg Experience, there are the almost-famous sandwiches of Primanti Bros (each sandwich containing
French fries and coleslaw as well as meat and cheese).
Foodies may wish to visit the nearby Strip District some morning.
The Strip is Pittsburgh’s somewhat diminished wholesale food distribution center, now a mecca for connoisseurs of street
food, fresh fish, Penzeys spices, Asian groceries, specialty coffees, biscotti, and locally made Italian-style sausages. It
is an area rich in seedy charm.
The hotel is also on the edge of the Cultural District. During the
conference, the Pittsburgh Symphony will be performing Stravinsky, Sibelius, and Shostakovich at opulent Heinz Hall, and
South Pacific will be featured at the glitzy Benedum Center.
Across the river, the Andy Warhol Museum is open until 10 p.m. on
Friday (half-price after 5 p.m.). In the other direction, on top of the bluff, Duquesne University’s Red Masquers, in
our honor, will be staging William Wycherley’s The Country Wife all three nights of our conference. Information
about that production will be available at the registration table.
So, come to Pittsburgh in November for intellectual excitement,
food, and collegiality. We look forward to welcoming you.
