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Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay Award

 

The Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay Award honors Tony Kaye (1962-2017), an innovative scholar of slavery at Penn State University and the National Humanities Center. Tony was an active member of the Society of Civil War Historians and one of the founding editors of the Journal of the Civil War Era. Tony’s contributions helped to make the journal an immediate success, engaging scholars across a wide variety of fields. The George and Ann Richards Civil War Era Center, the Journal of the Civil War Era, UNC Press, and the Society of Civil War Historians created this award to honor Tony’s passion for putting scholars in disparate fields in conversation with each other to enrich our understanding of the past.

Congratulations to Jacob Calhoun

The Journal of the Civil War Era is pleased to announce that Dr. Jacob Calhoun has been selected as the recipient of the Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay Award for 2025. The prize committee consisted of Paul Barba, Erin Mauldin, and Whitney Stewart. In their selection report, they wrote, “By closely and creatively interrogating the records of the coroner’s offices in Memphis and New Orleans in the aftermath of the 1866 massacres, Calhoun reveals the vast power and responsibility vested in these officials and their institutions. Significantly, Calhoun demonstrates in convincing fashion how these men shaped both the government’s investigations of mass racist violence and how historians have interpreted these pivotal moments in Civil War era history. Insightful and meticulous, Calhoun’s essay brings into relief the enduring methodological value of close readings and comparative lenses.”

Congratulations, Jacob, and thanks to the awards committee for their service! 

Previous Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay Award Winners:

2023: Lindsey R. Peterson, "'Homebuilders': Gender and Union Commemoration in the Trans-Mississippi West."

2021: Bryan P. Lapointe, “A Right to Speak: Toward a Political History of Former Slaves Before the American Civil War.”

2019: Robert Colby, “’Negroes Will Bear Fabulous Prices:’ The Economics of Wartime Slave Commerce and Visions of the Confederate Future.”