The McNeil Center for Early American Studies will get a new home in a new building, to be located on the east side of 34th Street, between Hill Field and Walnut Street. The building will be funded by a $6 million gift by the Barra Foundation and Robert L. McNeil Jr., the foundation’s chairman.
“This financial support will provide us with a fabulous facility,” said Dr. Daniel K. Richter, the professor of history who serves as the center’s director. “For many years to come, we will be able to serve the academic community interested in the early American period and to expand our role as the nation’s premier incubator of young scholars doing innovative research on the people of early America.”
The McNeil Center was founded in 1978 by Dr. Richard S. Dunn, emeritus professor of American history. It specializes in the histories and cultures of North America before 1850, with an emphasis on the mid-Atlantic region and on promoting the scholarly use of the Philadelphia area’s rich research collections. It offers pre- and post-doctoral fellowships, a seminar series, and national symposia on specialized topics. The center has also teamed up with the University of Pennsylvania Press to publish a book series and Early American Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, the first issue of which will appear this spring.
Noting that the center has provided an “important interdisciplinary venue to highlight the critical role the study of our nation’s past plays in understanding and shaping our future,” Penn President Judith Rodin CW’66 said that the “generous funding” by the Barra Foundation and McNeil “recognizes [Penn’s] role as a national leader in research and scholarship on early American studies.”