David Gordon was born in Brooklyn, and received his B.A. from Brooklyn College. He subsequently received his M.A. and Ph.D. in History from Brown University. Gordon is the author of two books, Merchants and Capitalists: Industrialization and Provincial Politics in Mid-Nineteenth Century France, and Liberalism and Social Reform: Industrial Growth and Progressiste Politics in France, 1880-1914, as well as a number of articles on French and African history. He has taught at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, the University of California at Riverside, where he was a union organizer, and the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. He also taught for two years as an exchange professor at Kaohsiung Teachers University, Taiwan, and was a seminar director at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes, Paris. He presently teaches in the History Department of Bronx Community College, and at the Graduate Center. Gordon has participated in a number of student and faculty study abroad initiatives. He has pledged himself to the restoration of the union welfare fund, and especially a reasonable dental plan. He believes we have lost too many benefits under the present leadership, and that it is time the union concentrate on the basic needs of its members.”