RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS
Explore opportunities to fund your next research project.
From scholars to pastors, graduate students, church historians, and other researchers working on projects related to Congregational Christian history, the Congregational Library & Archives has fellowship opportunities to help support the cost of traveling to Boston to work with our collections at 14 Beacon. Read on to learn more and begin your application.
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium
Applications due February 1, 2025.
The Congregational Library & Archives is a member of the New England Regional Fellowship Consortium (NERFC), a collaboration of 31 major cultural agencies. NERFC grants support work in a broad array of fields, including but not limited to: history, literature, art, history, African American studies, American Studies, women’s and gender studies, anthropology, sociology, philosophy, religious studies, environmental studies, oceanography, and the histories of law, medicine, and technology.
Each grant provides a stipend of $5,000 for a minimum of eight weeks of research at participating institutions. Awards are open to U.S. citizens and foreign nationals who hold the necessary U.S. government documents.
For a full list of participating institutions, more information on deadlines and requirements, and to apply please consult the NERFC page on the Massachusetts Historical Society website.
Fellows will be invited to present their project findings as part of the CLA's annual program offerings.
For further information contact Congregational Library & Archives' Archivist Billy McCarthy (wmccarthy@14beacon.org)
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellowship
Applications due April 15, 2025.
The Congregational Library & Archives has partnered with the Boston Athenaeum in offering a fellowship which supports research in American religious history involving the collections of both libraries.
The award includes a stipend of $2,000 for a residency of 20 days (four weeks) and includes a year's membership to both institutions. Applicants must be U.S. citizens or foreign nationals holding the appropriate U.S. government documents.
For more information and to apply, please consult the Boston Athenaeum's website.
Applicants should list the collections in both institutions which they plan to use during their fellowships. Those who do not hold a PhD should arrange for a letter of recommendation from a dissertation advisor or supervisor. Secondary school teachers need to arrange for two (2) letters of recommendation. Recommendations should be emailed directly to fellowships@bostonathenaeum.org by the recommender. The subject line should contain the applicant’s full name.
Fellows will be invited to present their project findings as part of the CLA's annual program offerings.
For further information contact the Congregational Library & Archives' Librarian Meaghan Wright (mwright@14beacon.org), or Mary Warnement, Head of Reader Services at the Boston Athenaeum (warnement@bostonathenaeum.org).
Arvel M. Steece Fellowship
Applications due October 31, 2024.
The Arvel M. Steece Fellowship, honoring Rev. Dr. Arvel M. Steece, supports a non-academic researcher working on a project focused on some aspect of Congregational Christian history grounded in the CLA’s collections. Pastors, church historians, artists, church members, and others are all encouraged to apply.
The award includes a stipend of $1,000 to support travel, lodging, and meals incurred during time on site at the library in Boston and includes a year's membership to the Congregational Library & Archives. Applicants must be U.S. citizens or foreign nationals holding the appropriate U.S. government documents.
The award will be announced on November 22, 2024, and the fellowship must be taken between December 1, 2024 and November 30, 2025.
Applicants must submit (1) their resume, and (2) a letter of reference from church or academic leadership indicating the value of the project to their Congregational community, (3) a title and description of their project, and (4) a list the collections which they plan to use during their fellowship via this online application form.
Fellows will be invited to present their project findings as part of the CLA's annual program offerings.
For further information contact the Congregational Library & Archives' Executive Director (kroberts@14beacon.org).
Congregational Library & Archives Research Fellowship
The Congregational Library & Archives also provides small but helpful travel scholarships for qualified researchers. For more information, please contact Executive Director Kyle Roberts at kroberts@14beacon.org.
PAST RECIPIENTS
2024-2025
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Anthony Trujillo, PhD candidate, Harvard University
"'The Life and Power of Religion:' Aesthetics, Settler Religiosity, Indigenous Christianity, and Pequot Women’s Power in the New England Borderlands, 1720-1840."
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellow
Dr. Thomas Lecaque, Grand View University
“Holy War Rhetoric in Early America: 1680-1765”
2023-2024
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Dr. Thomas Lecaque, Grand View University
“Holy War Rhetoric in Colonial America”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Daniel Howlett, PhD candidate, George Mason University
“Embodied Providence in Early America, 1662-1823”
Dax Mathew, PhD candidate, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
“’Hume of Ahmednagar,’ An American Missionary in British India 1874-1926: Robert Allen Hume, Philanthropist and Proto Nationalist”
Jocelyn Rice, PhD candidate, Boston College
“Collegiate Style: Tracking Institutional Change through the Production and Consumption of Architecture”
Dr. Ryan Tobler, Brigham Young University
“Souls at Sea: Religion, Reform, and the American Sailor”
2022-2023
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Dr. Christopher Walton, Southern Methodist University
“At Home in War: Religion in the Connecticut River Valley During the American Revolution”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Dr. Edward Andrews, Providence College
“Newport Gardner’s Anthem: Composing Slavery and Freedom in Early America”
Dr. Barry Huff, Principia College
“Slavery, Suffrage, and Science: Mary Baker Eddy and Biblical Interpretation in Nineteenth-Century New England”
Kayleigh Whitman, Vanderbilt University
“Faith in the World Community: Sue Bailey Thurman and Black Women’s World Reconstruction, 1920-1950”
Congregational Library & Archives Research Fellow
Rev. Dr. Kazimierz Bem, First Church in Marlborough, Massachusetts
“Anarchists, Communists, and Women: Congregational Missions to Polish Immigrants in Twentieth-Century America”
2021-2022
No fellowships awarded due to the COVID pandemic.
2020-2021
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Sarah Pawlicki, PhD candidate, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
“I Hear That God Saith Work”: Mortality, Temporality, and Labor in New England, 1619-1680”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Dr. Erik Nordbye, Harvard University
“The Cost of Free Religion: Religious and Economic Liberties in New England after the Great Awakening”
Dr. Erin Runions, Pomona College
“Fallen Angels and Hell in Proslavery and Abolitionist Discourses, 1830-1865”
2019-2020
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Hannah Peckham, PhD candidate, University of Notre Dame
“The Rise and Fall of the Amateur Expert in American Life, 1880-1955”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Dr. Emily Clark, Johns Hopkins University
“Renouncing Motherhood: Women’s Sexualities and Labors in Eighteenth-Century New England”
Dr. Catherine Sasanov, Independent Scholar
“The Last & Living Words of Mark: Following the Clues to the Enslaved Man’s Life, Afterlife, and to His Community in Boston, Charlestown, and South Shore Massachusetts”
Dr. Dylan Yeats, New York University
“Shaping Northern Political Culture: Evangelical Networks and the Politics of State Building, 1790-1840”
2018-2019
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Erin Fulton, PhD candidate, University of Kentucky
“Vestry Meetings and Vestry Music in New England, 1841-1848”
2017-2018
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Nicholas Bonneau, PhD candidate, University of Notre Dame
“Unspeakable Loss: North America’s Invisible Throat Distemper Epidemics, 1735 – 1765”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Dr. Christopher Babits, University of Texas–Austin
“To Cure a Sinful Nation: a Cultural History of Conversion Therapy and the Making of Modern America, 1930 to the Present Day”
Dr. Amy Voorhees, Independent Scholar
“Christian Science Identity and New England Cultures, 1820-1920”
2016-2017
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Dr. Jessica Parr, University of New Hampshire, Manchester
“Let Us Not Sell Our Birthrights”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Dr. Matthew Ghazarian, Columbia University
“Famine and the American Protestant Mission: Humanitarianism and Sectarianism in Turkey, 1858-1893”
Dr. Kenyon Gradert, Washington University in St. Louis
“The Second Reformation: Protestant Inheritance in Antislavery New England”
2015-2016
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Sonia Hazard, PhD candidate, Duke University
“The American Tract Society and the Materiality of Print in Antebellum America”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellows
Dr. Jenny Barker-Devine, Illinois College
“American Athena: Constructing Victorian Womanhood on the Midwestern Frontier”
Dr. Bradley Dixon, University of Texas at Austin
“Republic of Indians: Indigenous Vassals, Subjects, and Citizens in Early America”
2014-2015
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Dr. Stephen Berry, Simmons College
“Importing the Exotic: Early American Maritime Encounters with World Religions”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellow
Dr. Nicholas Bonneau, University of Notre Dame
“Unspeakable Loss: New England’s Invisible Throat Distemper Epidemic of 1735-1740”
2013-2014
American Congregational Association - Boston Athenaeum Fellow
Amy Voorhees, University of California, Santa Barbara
“Faith, Gender, and Place in Mary Baker Eddy’s New England”
New England Regional Fellowship Consortium Fellow
Richard Boles, The George Washington University
“Dividing the Faith: the Rise of Racially Segregated Northern Churches, 1730-1850”