Ok, I figured it out! Just because I know someone else will go through this:
Gentlemen, the touchscreen is working!
In case it comes up on Jeopardy later, here's how I did it:
Download the eGalaxTouch driver from
http://home.eeti.com.tw/web20/egalax...nuxDriver.html
Install and unpack.
Now this was the tricky part: in Ubuntu 9.10 the xorg.conf file has been deprecated in favor of a more XML-type configuration. BUT, that doesn't mean it doesn't still work! So, add an empty xorg.conf to /etc/X11
Then browse to the eGalaxTouch32 directory you just unpacked and run sudo sh setup.sh .
Choose "3" for USB. If you've done everything right, the system should now ask you to restart. Once you do, again browse to the eGalaxTouch32 directory and run ./eGalaxTouch.
This should bring up the configuration menu, and Bob's yer uncle!