At the Bisbee Tea, Bisbee prize-winner Aneesha Mehta (Class I) explains an aspect of her research paper, “The Worst Criminal is often Outside the Bars: An Examination of the Cruelties of Solitary Confinement in Three of America’s Greatest Penitentiaries.” The Bisbee Prize honors and celebrates outstanding student research in U. S. history. Each year, faculty who teach the U. S. History and U. S. History in the Modern World courses choose recipients from among their students. Aneesha is one of nine prize-winners whose research ranged from the Salem witch trials of 1692 through an examination of food and alterations in the U. S. agricultural system from the 1970s through the 1990s.
Winners recognized at this year’s Bisbee Tea included:
Angela Berkowitz for “Christianity on Trial: The Salem Witch Crisis of 1692 and the Evolution-Creationism Conflicts of 1925”
Michael Char for “An Ocean of Difference in the Treatment of Japanese Americans during World War II”
Elizabeth Dingle for “Television in Modern Politics: John F. Kennedy and the 1960 Election”
Marco Barber Grossi for “Prohibition: The Protection of Citizens or the Persecution of Citizens”
Noelle Hiam for “Indian Activism and the Pine Ridge Reservation”
Samuel Karlinski for “The California Gold Rush: The Inevitable Fulfillment of Manifest Destiny”
Aneesha Mehta for “The Worst Criminal is often Outside the Bars: An Examination of the Cruelties of Solitary Confinement in Three of America’s Greatest Penitentiaries.”
Jackson Tse for “American Interventionism: Philippines, Panama and Vietnam
Was the United States more motivated by a philosophy of economics, or a legitimate urge to improve the world?”
Alisha Zou for “Food: The Weapon, Alterations of the Agricultural System from the 1970’s–1990’s”
The Bisbee Prize was established to honor Ethan Wyatt Bisbee, faculty member in the history department who retired in 1993, after 40 years of teaching. The prize was endowed in 2005 through a gift by John Warren, formerly of the history department and now head of school at St. Mark’s School, and his wife, Laura Warren ’78, former head of Robbins House.
