Taylor's The Divided Ground: Indians, Settlers, and the Northern Borderland of the American Revolution (2006) explored the history of the borders between Canada and the United States in the aftermath of the American Revolution, as well as Iroquois attempts to keep control of some lands. Taylor is among a generation of historians committed to the revival of narrative history, incorporating many historical methods (political, social, cultural, and environmental, among others) to understand humans' experiences of the past. Using court records, land records, letters and diaries, Taylor reconstructed the background of founder William Cooper from Burlington, New Jersey, and the economic, political and social history related to the land speculation, founding and settlement of Cooperstown, New York, after the American Revolutionary War. Taylor is best known for his contributions to microhistory, exemplified in his William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic (1996). He graduated from Colby College, in Waterville, Maine, in 1977, and earned his PhD from Brandeis University in 1986.īefore coming to University of Virginia, Taylor taught previously at the University of California, Davis and Boston University. Taylor was born in Portland, Maine, the son of Ruel Taylor, Jr. In 2020 he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. Taylor has received two Pulitzer Prizes and the Bancroft Prize, and was also a finalist for the National Book Award for non-fiction. A specialist in the early history of the United States, Taylor has written extensively about the colonial history of the United States, the American Revolution and the early American Republic. The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832ġ996 Bancroft Prize, 1996 Beveridge Award, 1996 Pulitzer Prize, 2014 Pulitzer PrizeĪlan Shaw Taylor (born June 17, 1955) is an American historian and scholar who is the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation Professor of History at the University of Virginia. William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic,

The civil war of 1812 by alan taylor