Doctoral student Anne Gray Fischer wins the prestigious Louis Pelzer Memorial Award from the Organization of American Historians (OAH). “It's an incredible honor to have my work recognized by the OAH, and a very gratifying measure of support from established scholars in my field,” says Fischer. A graduate student is presented the annual award for the best essay in American History. This is the second year in a row a Brown graduate student has won (Daniel Platt won in 2017); both students are under the mentorship of Professor Robert Self.

Fisher wins for her research titled, “‘Land of the White Hunter’: Legal Liberalism and the Racial Politics of Morals Enforcement in Midcentury Los Angeles.” The OAH committee’s praise includes: Her scholarship is “timely” and “provocative,” and her essay “hits all the right marks,” bringing “to light things [we] didn’t know.”

The essay will appear in the March 2019 issue of the Journal of American History.