Editor's introduction

Volume 26 of Research in Economic History includes six papers, evenly divided between European and North American topics. Beginning with the European topics, we have two data intensive papers and a survey/synthesis. Stefano Fenoaltea and Carlo Ciccarelli provide new estimates of social overhead investment in the different regions of Italy. This is followed by Markus Lampe's paper reporting data on bilateral trade flows in Europe between 1857 and 1875. The third contribution on a European topic is Bernard Harris's survey of the literature on gender, health, and welfare in England and Wales since industrialization.