Mount Vernon continues to foster academic research on George Washington and the founding era. Now in its nineth year, the Research Fellowships program offers long- and short-term fellowships for scholars. This program provides funding and living space at the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington. Fellows gain access to the Library’s collections and interact with Mount Vernon staff to advance their academic pursuits.
2019–2020 Research Fellows
Sheila Arnold
New York Presidency: Slaves, Servants and the Washington Family
George W. Boudreau, Ph.D.
“Telling the Story”: Material Culture, Surviving Spaces, and the Presentation of Early America’s History
Lydia Mattice Brandt, Ph.D.
John Gadsby Chapman’s America
Recipient of the Dr. William M. and Betty H. Busey Family Fellowship
Valérie Capdeville, Ph.D.
George Washington, Clubbable Gentleman: The Role of Colonial Clubs in the Building of Social and Political Identities and Networks
Dusty Dye
“A Decent External Sorrow”: Death, Mourning, and the American Revolution
Recipient of the Amanda and Greg Gregory Fellowship
Ronald Fuchs II
George Washington, His Coat of Arms, and the Cincinnati Service
Alexi Garrett
Martha Washington and the Business of Slavery at Mount Vernon
Recipient of the James C. Rees Entrepreneurship Fellowship funded by the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation
Ann Bay Goddin
Coming to the Rescue: Ann Pamela Cunningham and the Beginning of America’s Historic Preservation Movement
Cassandra Good, Ph.D.
Children of Washington: The Custis Grandchildren and the Politics of Family in America, 1776–1865
Odai Johnson, Ph.D.
Staging the Revolution: Washington and the Theatre of War
Recipient of the Society of Colonial Wars Fellowship
Martha J. King, Ph.D.
A Revolutionary Army at Play: Catharine Littlefield Greene and Her Coterie in the Carolina Lowcountry
Gerard N. Magliocca
Washington’s Heir: The Life of Justice Bushrod Washington
Marcus P. Nevius, Ph.D.
“city of refuge”: Dismal Plantation in the Revolutionary War Era
Patrick O’Donnell
The Indispensables: A Band of Brothers and Their Crucial Role Fighting the Revolution
Derek Kane O’Leary
Writing Washington for an Atlantic Audience before the Civil War
Franklin Sammons
Yazoo’s Settlement: Law, Finance, and Dispossession in the Southeastern Borderlands
Laura Sandy, Ph.D.
A Tale of Two Masters: Managing Free and Enslaved Labour at Mount Vernon and Monticello
Nora Slonimsky, Ph.D.
The Engine of Free Expression: Copyrighting the State in Early America
Jillian B. Vaum
Washington’s Body Servant: Freedom and Memory in Antebellum America
John C. Winters
The Peace Medal’s Glare: Red Jacket, the Washington Administration, and the Origins of Iroquois Exceptionalism
2020–2021 Research Fellows
Jessica Anthony
Washington in Extremis: A Novel
Annette Atkins, Ph.D.
Walking Across Mount Vernon: Slippers, Boots, and Barefeet, 1760–1820
Kristen E. Beales, Ph.D.
Spirited Exchanges: The Religion of the Marketplace in Early America
Keith Beutler, Ph.D.
Mount Vernon as a Memory Palace, 1799–Today
Scott E. Casper, Ph.D.
Documenting Mount Vernon’s Enslaved Community, 1802–1861
Cynthia E. Chin, Ph.D.
Embodied and Envoiced: The Global and Local Nexus of Martha Washington’s Silk Gown
Charles Stuart Clark
First Son: The Life and Legacy of George Washington Parke Custis
Frank Cogliano, Ph.D.
The Relationship between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson
Lukas Etter, Ph.D.
Benjamin Banneker, Frances “Fanny” Bassett Washington, and Early Republic Arithmetic
David K. Hildebrand, Ph.D.
The Colonial Music Institute Moves to Mount Vernon: New Access and Purpose for Cultural Historical Records and Applications
Vitor Izecksohn, Ph.D.
Race and Militias in Colonial Rio de Janeiro and the Provinces of Massachusetts and Virginia, 1750–1775
Recipient of the Society of Colonial Wars Fellowship
Cynthia A. Kierner, Ph.D.
The Tory’s Wife: Jane Spurgin and Her Family in Revolutionary America
Recipient of the Amelie W. Cagle Fellowship
Jean B. Lee, Ph.D.
Mount Vernon and the Nation: From the Revolution to the Civil War
Turk McCleskey, Ph.D.
Debt Litigation and Intercolonial Rivalry at Fort Pitt, 1773–1775
Lisa McGunigal, Ph.D.
Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association: Restoring and Changing the 19th Century Patriotic Landscape
Timothy Andrew Murray, Ph.D.
The Comparative Historical Archaeology of Plantations in
Virginia and the Great Estates of Eastern Australia 1788–1840
Charles P. Neimeyer, Ph.D.
Lieutenant General George Washington: The Politics of Command, 1775–1781
Tyson F. Reeder, Ph.D.
Foreign Intrigues: James Madison, Party Politics, and Foreign Meddling in Early America
Monica Rico, Ph.D.
George Washington’s Greenhouse: Horticultural Knowledge in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World
Recipient of the Dr. William M. and Betty H. Busey Family Fellowship
Andrew W. Robertson, Ph.D.
Democracy in the Early Republic: America’s Other “Peculiar Institution”
Seynabou Thiam-Pereira
A Comparative Study of the Free Black Loyalists in the Maritime Provinces (1783–1812)
Hannah Knox Tucker
George Washington’s Maritime Marketplace: Networks, Credit, and Intelligence in the Maritime Chesapeake, 1720–1776
Recipient of the James C. Rees Entrepreneurship Fellowship funded by the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation
Maurizio Valsania, Ph.D.
George Washington: Portrait of the First American Male
Recipient of the James C. Rees Fellowship on the Leadership of George Washington
Rachel Walker, Ph.D.
Founding Faces: Power, Politics, and Popular Science in Early America
If you would like to sponsor a fellowship at the Washington Library, contact the Development Department at 703.799.8647.