George Washington Book Prize

The George Washington Book Prize was instituted in 2005 and is awarded annually to the best book on the founding era of the United States; especially ones that have the potential to advance broad public understanding of American history. It is administered by Washington College’s C.V. Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience; it is sponsored by Washington College in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and George Washington’s Mount Vernon. At $50,000, the George Washington Book Prize is one of the largest book awards in the United States.

Each year the sponsors appoint a jury of three historians or other qualified scholars who are asked to read all submitted books and narrow the field to three finalists. The finalists are announced at Washington College on or near George Washington's birthday in February. A seven-member committee, made up of two representatives of each of the three sponsoring institutions plus an independent historian, reviews the finalists and chooses a winner. The winner is announced at a gala dinner at Mount Vernon each May that honors the finalists.[1]

Sponsoring organizations

Established in 2000 with a grant from the New York-based Starr Foundation, the C.V. Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience draws on the special historical strengths of Washington College and the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Through educational programs, scholarship, and public outreach, the Starr Center explores the early republic, the rise of democracy, and the manifold ways in which the founding era continues to shape United States culture. In partnership with other institutions and with leading scholars and writers, the Center works to promote innovative approaches to the study of history, and to bridge the gaps between historians, contemporary policymakers, and the general public. Washington College was founded in 1782 under the patronage of George Washington, and was the first college chartered in the new nation.

Founded in 1994, the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History promotes the study and love of American history among audiences ranging from students to scholars to the general public. It creates history-centered schools and academic research centers, organizes seminars and enrichment programs for educators, produces print and electronic publications and traveling exhibitions, and sponsors lectures by eminent historians. In addition to the George Washington Book Prize, the Institute also sponsors the Lincoln Prize in conjunction with the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College, and the Frederick Douglass Prize in cooperation with the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University.

George Washington's Mount Vernon Estate and Gardens, open to the public since 1858, communicates the character and leadership of Washington to millions of Americans each year through a variety of interpretive programs on the Estate and in classrooms across the nation. Mount Vernon is owned and operated by the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, founded in 1853, making it the oldest national preservation organization in the United States. The George Washington Book Prize is an important element of the Association’s outreach program, which engages millions of teachers and students throughout the nation.

Table of Past Winners
Year Author Work Ref
2005 Ron Chernow Alexander Hamilton [2]
2006 Stacy Schiff A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America
2007 Charles Rappleye Sons of Providence: The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution
2008 Marcus Rediker The Slave Ship: A Human History
2009 Annette Gordon-Reed The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family
2010 Richard Beeman Plain, Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution
2011 Pauline Maier Ratification: The People Debate the Constitution: 1787-1788
2012 Maya Jasanoff Liberty's Exiles: American Loyalists in the Revolutionary World
2013 Stephen Brumwell George Washington: Gentleman Warrior
2014 Andrew Jackson O'Shaughnessy The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution and the Fate of the Empire [3]
2015 Nick Bunker An Empire on the Edge: How Britain Came to Fight America
2015 Special Achievement Award Lin-Manuel Miranda Hamilton [4]
2016 Flora Fraser The Washingtons: George and Martha, “Join’d by Friendship, Crown’d by Love”
2017 Nathaniel Philbrick Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution
2018 Kevin J. Hayes George Washington: A Life in Books
2019 Colin Calloway The Indian World of George Washington: The First President, the First Americans, and the Birth of the Nation
2020 Rick Atkinson The British are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777

Table of Past Finalists

= winner

Year Author Book
2005 Ron Chernow Alexander Hamilton
Rhys Isaac Landon Carter's Uneasy Kingdom
Gordon Wood The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin
2006 Edward G. Lengel General George Washington: A Military Life
Stacy Schiff A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France and the Birth of America
Stanley Weintraub America's Battle for Freedom, Britain's Quagmire: 1775-1883
2007 Catherine Allgor A Perfect Union
Francois Furstenberg In the Name of the Father
Charles Rappleye Sons of Providence: The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade and the American Revolution
2008 Woody Holton Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution
Jon Latimer 1812: War With America
Marcus Rediker The Slave Ship: A Human History
2009 Annette Gordon-Reed The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family
Kevin J. Hayes The Road to Monticello: The Life and Mind of Thomas Jefferson
Jane Kamensky The Exchange Artist: A Tale of High-Flying Speculation and America's First Banking Collapse
2010 Richard Beeman Plain, Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution
R. B. Bernstein The Founding Fathers Reconsidered
Edith Gelles John and Abigail: Portrait of a Marriage
2011 Pauline Maier Ratification: The People Debate the Constitution, 1787-1788
Jack Rakove Revolutionaries: A New History of the Invention of America
Alan Taylor The Civil War of 1812: American Citizens, British Subjects, Irish Rebels, and Indian Allies
2012 John Fea Was America Founded As A Christian Nation?: A Historical Introduction
Benjamin H. Irvin Clothed in Robes of Sovereignty: The Continental Congress and the People Out of Doors
Maya Jasanoff Liberty's Exiles: American Loyalists in the Revolutionary World
2013 Stephen Brumwell George Washington: Gentleman Warrior
Eliga H. Gould Among the Powers of the Earth: The American Revolution and the Making of a New World Empire
Cynthia A. Kierner Martha Jefferson Randolph, Daughter of Monticello: her Life and Times
Brian Steele Thomas Jefferson and American Nationhood
2014 Andrew Jackson O'Shaughnessy The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of the Empire
Jeffrey L. Pasley The First Presidential Contest: 1796 and the Founding of American Democracy[5]
Alan Taylor The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832
2015 Nick Bunker An Empire on the Edge: How Britain Came to Fight America
Richard S. Dunn A Tale of Two Plantations: Slave Life and Labor in Jamaica and Virginia
François Furstenberg When the United States Spoke French: Five Refugees Who Shaped a Nation
Eric Nelson The Royalist Revolution: Monarchy and the American Founding
2016 Mary Sarah Bilder Madison’s Hand: Revising the Constitutional Convention
Kathleen DuVal Independence Lost: Lives on the Edge of the American Revolution
Flora Fraser The Washingtons: George and Martha, "Join’d by Friendship, Crown'd by Love"
Robert Middlekauff Washington’s Revolution: The Making of America’s First Leader
Janet Polasky Revolutions without Borders: The Call to Liberty in the Atlantic World
David Preston Braddock’s Defeat
John Sedgwick War of Two
2017 T.H. Breen George Washington’s Journey: The President Forges a New Nation
Annette Gordon-Reed and Peter S. Onuf "Most Blessed of the Patriarchs": Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination
Michael Klarman The Framers' Coup: The Making of the United States Constitution
Jane Kamensky A Revolution in Color: The World of John Singleton Copley
Mark Edward Lender and Garry Wheeler Stone Fatal Sunday: George Washington, the Monmouth Campaign, and the Politics of Battle
Nathaniel Philbrick Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution
Alan Taylor American Revolutions: A Continental History, 1750-1804
2018 S. Max Edelson The New Map of Empire: How Britain Imagined America before Independence
Kevin J. Hayes George Washington: A Life in Books
Eric Hinderaker Boston’s Massacre
Jon Kukla Patrick Henry: Champion of Liberty
James E. Lewis, Jr. The Burr Conspiracy: Uncovering the Story of an Early American Crisis
Jennifer Van Horn The Power of Objects in Eighteenth-Century British America
Douglas L. Winiarski Darkness Falls on the Land of Light: Experiencing Religious Awakenings in Eighteenth-Century New England
2019 Colin Calloway The Indian World of George Washington: The First President, the First Americans, and the Birth of the Nation
Stephen Fried Rush: Revolution, Madness, and Benjamin Rush, the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father
Catherine Kerrison Jefferson’s Daughters: Three Sisters, White and Black, in a Young America
Joyce Lee Malcolm The Tragedy of Benedict Arnold: An American Life
Nathaniel Philbrick In the Hurricane’s Eye: The Genius of George Washington and the Victory at Yorktown
Russell Shorto Revolution Song: A Story of American Freedom
Peter Stark Young Washington: How Wilderness and War Forged America's Founding Father
2020 Rick Atkinson The British are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777
Richard Bell Stolen: Five Free Boys Kidnapped into Slavery and Their Astonishing Odyssey Home
Matthew R. Costello The Property of the Nation: George Washington's Tomb, Mount Vernon, and the Memory of the First President
Douglas Egerton Heirs of an Honored Name: The Decline of the Adams Family and the Rise of Modern America
Richard Godbeer World of Trouble: A Philadelphia Quaker Family's Journey through the American Revolution
David Head A Crisis of Peace: George Washington, the Newburgh Conspiracy, and the Fate of the American Revolution
Martha Saxton The Widow Washington: The Life of Mary Washington

References
  1. "George Washington Book Prize", Washington College
  2. "George Washington Book Prize". Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.
  3. Ron Charles (May 23, 2014). "O'Shaughnessy's 'Men Who Lost America' wins $50,000 George Washington Book Prize". Washington Post. Retrieved May 28, 2014.
  4. ""Hamilton" Awarded George Washington Prize". Washington College. December 14, 2015.
  5. "Finalists for the Washington Book Prize", Washington College
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