This symposium article examines articles published in Public Administration Review (PAR) between 1980 and 1995 in order to determine the prevalence of work on the field's historical roots. The results provide evidence of a paucity of historical concerns during that period. This is unfortunate because the field's identity is inextricably bound up with the way practitioners view its history. In many cases, those views are seldom examined in depth. Thorough and influential historical analyses can change those preconceptions and the field's identity in significant and beneficial ways. For example, it is common to attribute a simplistic politics/administration dichotomy to Woodrow Wilson, when careful study reveals that he held a much more complex and ambiguous view which supported broad grants of discretionary powers for public administrators. However, a PAR article by Doig (1983) on this point received little attention in the field. A robust discussion of Wilson's work in the field's major journals and textbooks could help public managers confront the reality of discretionary powers in more sensible ways.