Goodbye, Dad.
OH is a family business, and Phil Rovang was at the heart of everything.
In case you missed it, a new study says that relying on ChatGPT to write for your or do creative work atrophies your brain. Building critical thinking skills with project-based learning helps to reverse it. More soon on how OH, Jr. is coming to fill the gap.
Phil Rovang, my father, OH champion, and a founding member of the OH executive board, passed away on June 18, 2025 after suffering a number of health blows in the last several months. He had lived with Parkinson’s for six years, but he had some heart issues, which were further complicated by recent diagnoses of bladder cancer and a lymphoma blood disorder.*
Dad was a man of grace, dignity, and above all, service. Dad trained as a historian and was set to be a high school history teacher before the Vietnam draft happened. He enlisted in the Air Force as a pilot, and served a total of 21 years in the the AF and the Iowa Air Guard. Dad’s service to others never stopped, and we eventually stopped trying to keep track of all of the volunteer initiatives with which he was involved.
OH is a family business. Throughout our childhood, both of my parents stressed the importance of learning about history as a way of making sense of the world. Their approach was foundational: from family trips to battlefields and museums, and visits to sites of historical importance, to just reading about history to learn something new. Dad was primarily interested in U.S. and presidential history, and he always had another new book he wanted to discuss. History wasn’t just a past-time, but an living interface with the world and the people who live in it. It enriches our experience, and helps us to understand what it means to be human.
My dad’s commitment to service and my parents’ overall life-approach to doing for others is why Obscure Histories is a nonprofit now, and why OH doesn’t commodify our content. It’s why we are committed to paying our contributors for their intellectual content because it’s worthy and valuable, not a resource to be stripmined. It’s why OH, Jr. is rooted in education, and providing something that will help learners gain professional skills and maybe even be forces of good in the world.
My parents have always held that it’s important to be of use in the world. Dad was all of that and more. The world will miss him. And to honor him, our work will continue so that his legacy of service lives on.
*Many of Dad’s ailments (Parkinson’s Disease, bladder cancer, blood disorder, etc.) have been shown to have a root cause in exposure to Agent Orange, used during the Vietnam war.
Wonderful tribute to your Dad!