Mackenzie Tor is a Friends of the MCEAS Dissertation Fellow and a PhD Candidate in History at the University of Missouri. Her research focuses broadly on nineteenth-century reform movements, African American intellectual history, and American political culture. Her dissertation utilizes race as a lens to view the temperance movement, specifically tracing the evolution of Black Americans’ participation in the cause.
Q: What drew you to the study of early America?
Tor: Early American history was one of my favorite subjects from a young age, and I credit a lot of that with growing up in Massachusetts! I remember my excitement for a 3rd grade field trip where we toured historic sites in my hometown of Framingham, or my dad waking me up at 4 am during spring vacation to watch the annual reenactment of the Battle of Lexington & Concord. As a kid, listening to my teachers, grandparents, and parents tell stories about this local history and noticing the ways it had been preserved in the area sparked a lot of curiosity in me. I used to try to visualize how significant events during the Salem Witchcraft Trials or the American Revolution had unfolded in the places around where I grew up based on what I had learned in school. So, I think that my love for early America ultimately sprouted from that sense of place I felt. Of course, one of the things that has kept learning exciting since then has been moving beyond that ‘the-Spirit-of-Massachusetts-is-the-Spirit-of-America’ narrative of early America. I enjoy learning what characterized that era in other places—especially since moving to Missouri for graduate school—and what it looked like for different groups of people.
Q: How did you become interested in your dissertation topic?
Tor: I almost hate to say that my interest in the temperance movement began about a decade (!) ago in my very first history class as an undergraduate at Providence College. While poking around online databases in search of a final research paper topic, I came across The Indictment and Trial of Sir Richard Rum, a play that temperance reformers disseminated widely in the antebellum era. The play seemed so silly to me that I laughed out loud, but it was clear that the reformers who read and republished it would have seen it as addressing a serious issue (albeit through comedy). I quickly became interested in this breach between current and past attitudes toward drinking, a topic that drove me to continue my research as a master’s student. The project then took on a new shape when I came across some temperance speeches given by Black abolitionists. Again, there seemed to be a wide gulf in the way that historians had written about the temperance movement—as a White, middle-class cause aimed at social control—and the way that Black activists spoke about it—as a meaningful action on the path toward emancipation. For me, addressing that gulf by listening to Black reformers to understand their motives and concerns on their own terms has been an enriching experience. It’s been anything but dry (pun absolutely intended)!
Q: What is something you’ve read or watched recently that other early Americanists might find interesting?
Tor: So many thoughts! I love reading fiction in my spare time and I recently read James McBride’s The Good Lord Bird, a fictional retelling of John Brown’s escapades during Bleeding Kansas and Harpers Ferry as seen through the eyes of an enslaved child named Henry Shackleford (aka Little Onion). It’s hilarious, it’s entertaining, but it’s also tragic. Most importantly, I love the way McBride is able to vivify history, making figures such as Brown, Frederick Douglass, and Harriet Tubman seem larger-than-life. I’d highly recommend it to any historians but especially those who appreciate historical fiction and historical imagination. The book was also recently turned into a limited TV series as well—I haven’t watched it yet, but I’ve heard great things about that as well!
Q: What is the primary source you’ve most enjoyed using in your research?
Tor: While conducting research at the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, MA this summer, I came across this Temperance Map. Published by a Baptist missionary in 1843, the map imagines a geography of temperance and intemperance. From north to south, one travels from the nation of ‘Self-Denial’ toward the country of ‘Intemperance.’ Each nation is divided into states and cities. Completing the map are geographic features such as the ‘Cold Water River,’ ‘Rum Lake,’ and the ‘Bay of Remorse,’ to name a few. What I love the most about this map is that it’s a really unconventional way of giving the historian a feel for the fabric of antebellum American morality. It’s helped me immensely in understanding how Americans conceived of goodness, worthiness, and virtue, especially in relation to drinking habits. I’m still thinking through all of the ways to use it in my research, but I could (and probably will) spend hours looking at it!
Q: What are you most enjoying about your Fellowship at the McNeil Center?
Tor: So far, I’ve been really enjoying the academic environment. As many of my colleagues at Mizzou can tell you, I love reading other scholars’ works-in-progress and I enjoy hearing the different perspectives everyone brings to the table. It’s heartening to see how generative it can be to be among a group of like-minded people who come from all different intellectual backgrounds. It’s only October, but I can already tell that I’ll have a stronger dissertation by the end of this year thanks to my peers here, the McNeil Center’s resources, and the access I have to amazing archives! Plus, living in Philly hasn’t been too shabby, either!
Mackenzie Tor is a Friends of the MCEAS Dissertation Fellow at the McNeil Center for Early American Studies. Read more about her dissertation on her bio page.