The David Center for the American Revolution at the American Philosophical Society and the Massachusetts Historical Society intend to host a conference on the theme “Empire and Its Discontent” at the Massachusetts Historical Society on December 1 and 2, 2023. This conference is part of a series of interdisciplinary and international meetings designed to re-examine the origins, course and consequences of the American Revolution. Our 2023 meetings mark the 260th anniversary of the Treaty of Paris that ended the Seven Years’ War and the 250th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. We intend to use this gathering to examine the British empire at its moment of great triumph, in 1763, with its enemies defeated and its control spreading from India to the Mississippi; and again at 1773, with its control beginning to slip away in North America as a radical mobilization began against imperial power.    

The program committee invites papers from historians and scholars working in all other fields whose research addresses questions of empire, revolution, and independence in the period between 1763 and 1773.

Applicants should submit a title and a 250-word proposal along with a C.V. by May 1, 2023 via Interfolio: https://apply.interfolio.com/121667

All scholars invited to participate will be notified by May 30, 2023. All presenters will receive travel subsidies and hotel accommodations to attend the gathering. Accepted papers will be due by November 1, 2023, a month before the conference, and these will be pre-circulated to registered attendees. Papers should be no longer than 20 double-spaced pages. Presenters may also have the opportunity to publish revised papers in an edited volume.

For more information, visit https://www.amphilsoc.org, or contact Adrianna Link, Head of Scholarly Programs, at [email protected].

The David Center for the American Revolution integrates the collections of the David Library with that of the APS to create a one-stop-shop for the study of the American Revolution.

The David Library collections consist of approximately 8,000 volumes, 9,000 reels of microfilm, and the large Sol Feinstone manuscript collection. The Sol Feinstone Collection, a rich collection of letters and documents, was assembled by DLAR Founder Sol Feinstone (1888-1980) over a period of fifty years. It includes material on almost all notable Americans from before the Revolution to the 1850s, as well as prominent Europeans and documents relating to military affairs. There are substantial groups of letters from: John Adams, Henry Dearborn, Alexander Hamilton, Jedidiah Huntington, Thomas Jefferson, Lafayette, George Washington, and a long run of letters from a Massachusetts military surgeon named Samuel Adams. Many letters, though written by revolutionary figures, relate to events that occurred before or after the War.

This adds to the APS Library's Early American History Collections, which are particularly strong for the period from 1750 to 1840. In addition to the Benjamin Franklin Papers and the Thomas Paine Collection, the APS has a wide assortment of documents from the revolutionary era. Among these are official government documents and correspondence, military records that range from the Continental Army to Pennsylvania county records, and personal correspondence from various historical actors. Notable collections of correspondence include the Nathanael Greene Papers, the Peale-Sellers Family Collection, the Richard Henry Lee Papers, and the William Temple Franklin Papers. 

Of particular note is the record of the American missions to Europe during the American Revolution. The William Temple Franklin Papers, the Arthur Lee Collection, the Benjamin Franklin Papers, and the Benjamin Franklin Bache collections provide a nearly complete window into America’s diplomatic maneuverings in Europe during the American Revolution. 

Finding aids that were previously available on the David Library website can be found to the right. Please check "Latest Updates" above for when the materials they list will be accessible.

The David Center aims to build a community of scholars through a program of long- and short-term fellowships. Check back soon for more information on our next round of David Center Fellowships. 

Brendan McConville (Co-Chair), Professor of History, Boston University and member of the David Library's Board of Trustees

Katherine Grandjean, Associate Professor of History, Wellesley College

Patrick Griffin, the Madden-Hennebry Professor at the University of Notre Dame

Woody Holton, the McCausland Professor of History at the University of South Carolina

Jack Rakove, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and William Robertson Coe Professor of History and American Studies, Stanford University

R. Scott Stephenson, President and CEO of the Museum of the American Revolution

The David Center regularly holds international conferences, public lectures, family and adult programming, and major exhibitions inspired by the Sol Feinstone Collection.

Wednesday, September 13: Rebecca Brannon, ""The Vale of Years into which I am very fast descending": Ideas and Realities of Aging in Revolutionary Times"

Wednesday, September 20: Norman E. "Ned" Donoghue II, Lunch at the Library: "Prisoners of Congress: Philadelphia Quakers in Exile, 1777-1778"

Wednesday, September 27: Norman E. "Ned" Donoghue II, David Center Lecture (Hosted at Washington Crossing): Prisoners of Congress: Philadelphia Quakers in Exile, 1777-1778"

Wednesday, October 11: Grant Stanton, "The Tory and the Patriot: Ezekiel Russell, Isaiah Thomas, and the Problem of Antislavery in the American Revolution"

Wednesday, November 8: Evan Turiano, "Somerset, the State, and Reciprocal Rights in American Abolitionism"

Wednesday, December 6: Blake McGready, "'All Nature's Face, is dug, pitch'd up & tore': The Loyalist Environmental Imagination from Occupied New York City"

Wednesday, January 24: Jennifer Egloff, "Revelation and the American Revolution: Understanding and Justifying War with Britain through Personal Prophecy and Biblical Exegesis"

Wednesday, March 6: Dillon Streifende, "From Jamaica with Reform: Sir Henry Moore's 'Reformation' and the Coming of the Revolution in New York, 1765-1775"

Wednesday, April 10: Kiernan O’Keefe, "Suffering for the Crown: The Hudson Valley Loyalists, Violence, and Forced Migration in Revolutionary North America"

The David Center for the American Revolution is a proud sponsor of America2026–a four-year collaborative program of scholarly events, publications and resources centred on the histories and memories of the American Revolution in comparative European and transatlantic perspective.

As the United States prepares to celebrate the 250th anniversary of its independence in 2026, America2026 aims to uncover, map, and analyse the networks and exchanges connecting the actors, the ideas and the legacies of the American Revolution across the Atlantic Ocean, from the mid-eighteenth century through the 1820s and in the present day. It seeks to fully contribute to the debates and the cultural and academic productions that will accompany this commemorative moment and lead to critical reviews of the study of the American Revolution.

Based in France, this program connects senior and junior researchers from France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States for a series of academic conferences and collective publications, an exhibition, and an upcoming improved and interactive website, which will host information about events and networks as well as resources about the changing meaning of 1776.  

For the most up-to-date information, sign up for their newsletter here:
https://www.america2026.eu/contact