The Caughey Western History Association Prize is given annually by the

Western History Association The Western History Association (WHA), a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, was founded in 1961 at Santa Fe, New Mexico by Ray Allen Billington, et al. Included in the field of study are the American West and western Canada. The Western History ...

to the best book published the previous year on the

American West The Western United States (also called the American West, the Western States, the Far West, the Western territories, and the West) is census regions United States Census Bureau As American settlement in the U.S. expanded westward, the mea ...

. The winner receives $2,500 and a certificate.

Winners

*2021 – Alice Baumgartner – ''South to Freedom: Runaway Slaves to Mexico and the Road to the Civil War''https://mahindrahumanities.fas.harvard.edu/people/alice-baumgartner *2020 – Maurice Crandall – ''These People Have Always Been a Republic: Indigenous Electorates in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands, 1598–1912'' *2019 – Monica Muñoz Martinez – ''The Injustice Never Leaves You: Anti-Mexican Violence in Texas'' *2018 – Louis Warren – ''God's Red Son: The Ghost Dance Religion and the Making of Modern America'' *2017 – James F. Brooks – ''Mesa of Sorrows: A History of the Awat'ovi Massacre'' *2016 – Edward Dallam Melillo – ''Strangers on Familiar Soil: Rediscovering the Chile–California Connection'' *2016 – Joshua Reid, ''The Sea Is My Country: The Maritime World of the Makahs'' *2015 – Andrew Needham – ''Power Lines: Phoenix and the Making of the Modern Southwest'' *2014 – Keith R. Widder – ''Beyond Pontiac's Shadow: Michilmackinac and the Anglo-Indian War of 1763'' *2013 – Frederick E. Hoxie – ''This Indian Country: American Indian Activists and the Place They Made'' *2012 – Anne F. Hyde – ''Empires, Nations and Families: A History of the North American West, 1800–1860'' *2011 –

Erika Lee Erika Lee is a historian and author. She is currently the inaugural Bae Family Professor of History at Harvard University, a position she began in July 2023. In addition, she is still active as an award-winning author, known for her non-fiction w ...

and

Judy Yung Judith "Judy" Yung (January 25, 1946 – December 14, 2020) was a librarian, community activist, historian and professor emeritus, emerita in American Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She specialized in oral history, women's h ...

– ''Angel Island: Immigrant Gateway to America'' *2010 – Elliott West – ''The Last Indian War: The Nez Perce Story'' *2009 –

Pekka Hämäläinen Pekka Johannes Hämäläinen (born 1967 in Helsinki) is a Finnish historian who has been the Rhodes Professor of American History at the University of Oxford since 2012. He was formerly in the history department at University of California, S ...

– ''The Comanche Empire'' *2008 – B. Byron Price – ''Charles M. Russell: A Catalogue Raisonné'' *2007 – Albert L. Hurtado – ''John Sutter: A Life on the North American Frontier'' *2006 – Louis S. Warren – ''Buffalo Bill's America: William Cody and the Wild West Show'' *2005 – Jeffrey Ostler – ''The Plains Sioux and U.S. Colonialism from Lewis and Clark to Wounded Knee'' *2004 – Colin G. Calloway – ''One Vast Winter Count: The Native American West Before Lewis and Clark'' *2003 –

Will Bagley William Grant Bagley (May 27, 1950 – September 28, 2021) was a historian specializing in the history of the Western United States and the American Old West. Bagley wrote about the fur trade, overland emigration, American Indians, military histor ...

– ''Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows'' *2002 –

Donald Worster Donald Worster (born 1941) is an American environmental historian who was, until his retirement, the Hall Distinguished Professor of American History at the University of Kansas. He is one of the founders of, and leading figures in, the field of ...

– ''A River Running West: The Life of John Wesley Powell'' *2001 – Robert V. Hine and John Mack Faragher – ''The American West: A New Interpretive History'' *2000 –

Walter Nugent Sir Walter Richard Nugent, 4th Baronet (12 December 1865 – 12 November 1955) was an Irish baronet, politician and member of parliament (MP) in the House of Commons from 1907 to 1918. Nugent was elected unopposed to the House of Commons as an ...

– ''Into the West: The Story of Its People'' *1999 – Elliott West – ''The Contested Plains: Indians, Goldseekers, and the Rush to Colorado'' *1998 – Malcolm J Rorhbough – ''Days of Gold: The California Gold Rush and the American Nation'' *1997 – Richard W. Etulain – ''Re–Imagining the Modern American West: A Century of Fiction, History and Art'' *1996 – David Wallace Adams – '' Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875–1928'' *1995 – Clyde A. Milner III, Carol A. O’Connor, Martha A. Sandweiss, eds. – ''The Oxford History of the American West'' *1994 – Robert M. Utley – ''The Lance and the Shield: The Life and Times of Sitting Bull'' *1993 – David J. Weber – ''The Spanish Frontier in North America'' ---- Prior to 1993, it was known as the Western History Association Prize for a “distinguished body of writing” ---- *1992 – Howard Lamar *1991 – W. Turrentine Jackson *1990 –

Wallace Stegner Wallace Earle Stegner (February 18, 1909 – April 13, 1993) was an American novelist, writer, environmentalist, and historian. He was often called "The Dean of Western Writers". He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1972 and the U.S. National Book Award ...

*1989 – William T. Hagan *1988 – Robert M. Utley *1987 – Francis Paul Prucha *1986 – Paul W. Gates *1985 – No Award Given *1984 – No Award Given *1983 – Robert G. Athearn

References

{{Reflist
Western History Association – Caughey Western History Prize
American non-fiction literary awards