Hahn earns grant to study piracy in London
The American Philosophical Society has awarded St. Olaf College Professor of History Steven Hahn a Franklin Research Grant that will enable him to conduct two weeks of research this summer at the British National Archives and the British Library in London.
Hahn’s project, “Three Articles on Piracy,” will be a continuation of his previous research on piracy in the Caribbean, which focuses on 209 pirates who were pardoned by the Bahamian government in the early 1700s. Hahn also will look into the life and history of Richard Tookerman, a Caribbean pirate with ties to South Carolina. Specifically, Hahn is interested in the social history of pirates and their everyday integration into various societies during the “Golden Age” of piracy that flourished after the end of Queen Anne’s War in 1713.
In addition to Atlantic piracy, Hahn’s scholarly research and teaching interests are centered on the fields of colonial American, Native American, and Atlantic world history. He has worked as a field archaeologist and has written two books about the history of the Muskogee (Creek) Indians and contributed to other books of similar topics. Hahn has been a member of the St. Olaf faculty since 2000.
The Franklin Research grant was developed in 1933 to provide monetary assistance to academics in all disciplines working toward the publication of their research.