Assistant Reviews Editor, The Public Historian 2022-2023

Read about my work as an IHC Public Humanities Fellow here.

My dissertation traces the rise of female hereditary organizations in the United States and argues that the organizations should be treated as a singular movement. I define hereditary organizations as those that restrict membership to those who are descendants of a certain group of people, usually or political or historical importance. I specifically look at women’s organizations because they occupy a particularly understudied channel of power in the United States. All-women hereditary organizations positioned themselves both as victims of misogyny, tracing their origin stories to being excluded from male hereditary and genealogy spaces, and also as wielders of political and social power. As daughters, mothers, and wives of the founders and defenders of America, they coronated themselves as keepers of American virtue and tradition