The McNeil Center facilitates scholarly inquiry into the histories and cultures of North America in the Atlantic world before 1850.
Follow us on Twitter @mcneilcenter The Center offers pre- and post-doctoral fellowships to encourage use of the Philadelphia area’s magnificent manuscript, rare book, and museum collections, conducts a seminar series to promote intellectual community among local and visiting faculty and graduate students, and organizes occasional national conferences to foster interdisciplinary research.
06/11/2026
Thanks to all who joined us at Stenton this week!
Event explores contradictions of revolutionary Philadelphia and slavery At a WHYY community event, historians and residents examined how one formerly enslaved woman's fight for freedom reveals the contradictions at the heart of America's founding.
05/10/2026
Our issue of includes four articles, all of which are available with open access via
Project MUSE!
Link: https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/56826
McNeil Center for Early American Studies University of Pennsylvania Press
11/24/2025
The issue is now openly accessible on Project MUSE!
Link: https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/55938
McNeil Center for Early American Studies University of Pennsylvania Press
If you are in the Delaware Valley area, an interview with MCEAS Director Emma Hart will air today on WHYY (91 FM) at noon !
11/18/2025
The biennial Daniel K. Richter Summer Writing Retreat will convene for the first time in June 2026 at the McNeil Center. The purpose of the retreat is to broaden the range of early Americanists who can benefit from the Center’s research amenities while making important contributions to the field. Each participant will be awarded $4,000, office space at the Center, and access to the University of Pennsylvania’s digital library holdings for one year. Applications open until Jan 15–apply here: https://www.mceas.org/awards/daniel-k-richter-summer-writing-retreat
10/21/2025
Join us at the Library of Congress on November 21st for a symposium reconsidering the principal scholarly work of the American Revolution's 1926 sesquicentennial commemoration, J. Franklin Jameson's "The American Revolution Considered as a Social Movement." Registration and more details here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1797806179679
10/07/2025
Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, this year's Distinguished Benjamin Franklin Lecturer, will deliver her first lecture, "On Seeing and Un-Seeing Slavery, or Learning to Reckon with the Black Spots in Early Modern Art," on Oct. 20 at Penn Carey Law. Register to attend here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2025-benjamin-franklin-distinguished-lectures-tickets-1623477016459?aff=oddtdtcreator
10/01/2025
Check out our newest episode of Early American Conversations, featuring Katharine Gerbner, now on Spotify!
https://open.spotify.com/episode/7GoWGVYGBilnKA3zvPOktw?si=_p10TxDiRzSyPmYQybdYEQ
This week Emma Hart, Director of the McNeil Center, participated in Penn's "60-Second Lectures" series for Constitution Day, and concisely presented the history of compromises in the drafting of the US Constitution.
Recently, Negin Farsad interviewed Emma Hart, Director of the McNeil Center, on the history of America's "Road to Democracy," for Visit Philly and TED Democracy. Full video here: https://www.ted.com/talks/visit_philadelphia_road_to_the_vote_the_great_experiment
