The Department of History offers instruction within the customary frameworks that have formed the basis of historical studies, and it also has developed special emphases in social, cultural, political, and economic perspectives that allow instruction and research on such topics as the African-American experience, the environment, business and economy, technology and science, medicine, women’s history and gender studies, legal history, and comparative social history. Courses in history, or a formal major or minor in history, traditionally have been attractive to students as preparation for a wide variety of career and professional interests, including teaching, law, government, and journalism, and such public history activities as archival administration, historical museum administration, restoration and preservation of historic sites, and writing.

FacilitiesCase Western Reserve University, the other institutions in University Circle, and the Cleveland area in general offer excellent facilities for historical research. These facilities are especially strong in the fields of social history and policy and in the history of medicine, health care, nonprofit organizations, technology, and science. The university library’s extensive collections in these fields are significantly augmented by the holdings of the nationally ranked Allen Memorial Library in the history of medicine and health care, and of the equally distinguished Western Reserve Historical Society in regional economic, social, nonprofit, ethnic, African-American, and Jewish history. Both the Allen Memorial Library and the Western Reserve Historical Society library are adjacent to the campus. The Cleveland Public Library, just five miles from campus in downtown Cleveland, is the third largest public library in the U.S.; it maintains excellent research collections in Ohio, U.S., and British history, technology, and business. The university has also pioneered the development of electronic connections to other libraries and to research resources in general; Ohio’s many colleges and universities have one of the nation’s leading interlibrary loan programs.