DESERT HARVEST—Spring 1991
Vol. 1, No. 2

Division continues to enjoy Fulbright Fellowship success

   In a singular show of confidence in our program and in the promising young scholars of the Division for Late Medieval and Reformation Studies, the national Fulbright committee this year recommeded all three of our highly-qualified applicants to the German Fulbright Committee for full fellowships.
    Pete Dykema, Eric Saak and Jeff Tyler carry on the impressive tradition of personal achievement set by the Division's 1990-1991 Fulbright Fellows, Robert Bast and Curtis Bostick . As these five students enter their final stages of doctoral work, they demonstrate that the rigorous training provided by the Division produces scholars to rival the country's—and indeed the world's—top historians.
    The members of the German Fulbright Committee will compare our applicants' resumes and proposed programs of study to those of the foremost candidates from other nations. It is an exceptional honor for our students to be solid contenders at this level of competition.
    Robert Bast, currently in Tübingen, has been accorded the rare honor of a seven-month extension of his fellowship. Bob and his family now plan to return to Tucson late in 1991. Curtis Bostick also won a coveted extension. The Bostick family will remain in Cambridge, England, until late summer.

Tyler to travel to Tübingen

    How did a small boy who once aspired to be a septic tank man end up with a Fulbright Fellowship? I have considered that quandary often in the last month. I suppose that impulse has resurfaced at the University of Arizona as I anticipate digging through dusty documents in German archives.
    But why forsake my earlier career plans in order to compete for a Fulbright? First, it allows me to pursue a problem in late-medieval and Reformation history which drives me to my desk and sometimes wakes me in the middle of the night. In part, I have been asking, why did so many bishops fail to crush the Protestant Reformation in Germany? As both princes and pastors, as administrators and inquisitors they collectively blanketed every foot of German soil with their authority; they ruled over an army of priestly underlings.
    As you may have already thought to yourself, this topic is much too large for a dissertation, let alone a lifetime. I have focused on the relationship between bishops and cities. From 1250 to 1555, bishops progressively surrendered control of urban life, even in most cities we call "episcopal" (which means bishops once ruled them as political overlords). Citizens initially broke episcopal power by driving their bishops outside the city walls. Over nearly three centuries bishops lost many of their political, economic, and even religious rights in the city. Many of those cities would subsequently recognize the Protestant Reformation. I hope to begin my investigation of episcopal decline and Reformation influence by studying two cases—bishop and city in Augsburg and Constance.
    This Fulbright fellowship comes at the end of almost thirteen years of preparation, the final five here at the Division. In nearly every one of the 26 semesters since high school, I have studied either a foreign language or history. Now at the end of three years of dissertation research the Fulbright allows me to take a crucial step. It makes possible a year in Germany. My background has never afforded me the chance to travel to Europe. In fact, as an undergraduate, after taking an 18 credit course on Classical Greece, I was offered a scholarship to spend six weeks in the eastern Mediterranean region. I had to turn it down in order to earn tuition money for the following academic year. This grant provides a financial base for travel and for nine months in Germany; it offers an additional six weeks of language study and the support of the University and an academic advisor.
    Most of all, the Fulbright relieves a severe and gnawing itch in my soul. Now at last, I will walk through the cities I have previously experienced from my desk in Tucson. I will spend long hours in the archives, deciphering and analyzing documents which have appeared to me only as titles in the teasing script of footnotes.
    I came to the University of Arizona in 1986, believing I would receive the training and the opportunity to compete effectively for grants such as the Fulbright. I have discovered more than Professor Oberman originally promised. During the past year, I have served as research assistant to Hans-Christoph Rublack, Professor of Modern History at the University of Tübingen, and this year, visiting lecturer at the University of Arizona. Next fall, he will serve as my Fulbright advisor. This October I will begin my first year in Tübingen, but my second with Professor Rublack. Even before I submitted my formal application to the Fulbright Foundation in September 1990, my journey to Europe had already begun.