SUNY Oneonta Students Receive Maynard Redfield History Essay Awards

Eight SUNY Oneonta students received awards in the 2025 Maynard Redfield History Essay competition, an annual event in which students submit essays in several categories to receive a certificate and a $75 check. The 2025 awards were handed out on Wednesday, April 22, 2026.

The Maynard Redfield History Essay Competition Committee invites students to enter their best history essay for the competition. The committee accepts and evaluates papers of any length submitted in a history course offered at SUNY Oneonta. Each category has a prize winner and an honorable mention. Students may present one essay for consideration in each category: Introductory Course Essay, Short Essay, Long Historiographic Essay and Long Research Essay.

Introductory Course Essay submissions must be from a 1000-2000 level History course. Short Essay submissions are anywhere from 1 to 12 pages in length. Both Long Historiographic Essay and Long Research Essay submissions must be at least 13 pages long.

The Introductory Course Essay winner was Maggie Reynolds-Rauch for "How Christianity was used in Pre-Emancipation Jamaica to Justify Slavery."

The Introductory Essay Honorable Mention was awarded to Gabriella Hill for "The "Gentle Pirate" and the Villain of the Seas."

The Short Essay winner was Luke Cellucci for "Huey Long: Populist Reaction to the New Deal."

The Short Essay Honorable Mention was awarded to Amanda Saunders for "The Sound of Resistance: Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" and the Birth of Modern Protest Music."

The Long Historiographic Essay winners were Gregory Garra for "The Historical Shaping of the American Frontier: Finding the Truth in the Fog of Fiction" and Logan Rogers for "The Historiography of 20th Century Urban Planning."

The Long Research Essay winner was Alexander LaFalce-Dooling for "Far From the Climate in Which You Were Born: A History of the Role of Writing in "Emigre Communities of the French and Russian Resistance."

The Long Research Essay Honorable Mention was awarded to Luca Montana for "A Pen in One Hand and an ArmaLite in the Other: How Bobby Sands' Writing Revealed the Trauma of Irish Paramilitary."

Prizes were made possible by the Maynard Redfield Fund. Dr. Redfield, a former professor in the History department, became the benefactor to present and future members of the department by establishing a fund, through a generous bequest, that facilitates faculty scholarship; many conference papers and publications have grown out of grants from the Redfield Fund. The Maynard Redfield History Essay Competition for undergraduate students also benefits from Dr. Redfield's generous donation and is named after him.

To view these students click here: https://oneonta.meritpages.com/achievements/SUNY-Oneonta-Students-Receive-Maynard-Redfield-History-Essay-Awards/201909