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The McNeil Center
Archives of Revolution: A Conference About How We Make the Past | 20-22 June 2024

As we approach a series of 250th anniversaries, the histories of the American Founding have never been more hotly contested.  In the United States, historians regard 2026 with some trepidation and a lot of determination to educate a wary public about the importance of evidence to the interpretation of the past. 

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Upcoming Events



Inhabitants, Residents, and Citizens: Asserting Belonging, 1776-1856

Brown Bag Session
Emily Yankowitz, Yale University
Oct 25, 2023 at - | Location: McNeil Center, Room 105/Zoom

Papers are circulated in advance. For copies, please contact the McNeil Center office.  -- Emily Yankowitz is a PhD candidate in the Department of History at Yale University. Her dissertation examines how early…



Debility, Impairment, and Settler Colonialism in the Antebellum United States

Friday Seminar
Elaine LaFay, Rutgers University-New Brunswick
Nov 3, 2023 at - | Location: Rutgers University-Camden, West ABC Conference Room, Lower Level of the Campus Center, 326 Penn Street, Camden, NJ/Zoom

Elaine LaFay is an assistant professor of history at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. She is a historian of climate and the body, specializing in the nineteenth century United States. Her current research seeks to…



Mapping Minisink: An Ambiguous Center in New Netherland

Brown Bag Session
Molly Leech, University of Pennsylvania
Nov 8, 2023 at - | Location: Zoom Only

Papers are circulated in advance. For copies, please contact the McNeil Center office.  -- Molly Leech is a PhD candidate in the Department of History at the University of Pennsylvania. Her dissertation research…

About the McNeil Center

Established as the Philadelphia Center for Early American Studies in 1978, and renamed in honor of its benefactor Robert L. McNeil, Jr., in 1998, the McNeil Center facilitates scholarly inquiry into the histories and cultures of North America in the Atlantic world before 1850, with a particular but by no means exclusive emphasis on the mid-Atlantic region.

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