History Faculty - Dr. Joseph Pratt

History Faculty / Pratt, Joseph A

Joseph Pratt

Joseph A. Pratt

Chairman of History
Cullen Professor of History and Business
550 Agnes Arnold Hall
Ph: (713) 743-3088
Fax: (713) 743-3216
joepratt@uh.edu

My undergraduate degree is in history from Rice University (1970), and my PH.D. is from Johns Hopkins (1976), where I studied economic history under Louis Galambos. I taught in the business school at the University of California-Berkeley, the Harvard Business School, and the history department at Texas A & M University before coming to the University of Houston 1986. At UH I have a joint appointment in history and management. For five years I also served as the Executive Director of the Scholars’ Community, the largest undergraduate retention program at UH, and I have been the chair of the history department since 2002. (CV)

Teaching:
I teach courses in energy, business, and public history, as well as the American history survey. In the business school, I teach the international environment of business, social responsibility and ethics, and topics in regulation. I have won university teaching awards at both UC-Berkeley and UH.

Research Interests:
My research is primarily in energy history and the history of the Houston region. I have published (as author or co-author) ten books. The most recent of these are Voice of the Marketplace (2002), a history of the National Petroleum Council, and Prelude to Merger (2000), a history of the Amoco Corporation from 1973-1998. Other oil and gas related books include Offshore Pioneers (1997), a history of the offshore construction work of Brown & Root, From Texas to the East (1993), a strategic history of Texas Eastern Corporation, and The Growth of a Refining Region (1980), an overview of the impact of the refining industry on the Texas-Louisiana Gulf coast. I have also written histories of several other Houston-area organizations (Texas Commerce banks and Baker & Botts law firm), a history of Consolidated Edison of New York City, a dual biography of Houston businessmen Herman and George R. Brown (Builders), and a general history of U.S. business and public policy (The Rise of the Corporate Commonwealth). Click here for the Japanese version.
My current research is on the history of the offshore petroleum industry.

In addition to my own research, I edit the “Oil and Business History Series” at Texas A&M University Press and the Houston Review.

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Department of History, 524 Agnes Arnold Hall, Houston TX 77204-3003 (713) 743-3083