On Being An Historian

When at the wise age of twenty, I decided to change my major from biology to history, I called my parents. They were baffled. I’d always been interested in the sciences and had started as a chemistry major, then shifted to biology. But history?

Then my dad asked a question I’ve always remembered, “Do you really love it?”

I thought for a moment about the required history course I’d taken my freshman year, how I’d savored my study time pouring over thick books on the Russian Revolution. H...