The Society for Military History

Announcements and Events

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AI TRANSCRIPTION GRANTS
Leo is a document management and transcription platform designed for historians, archivists, and family researchers by a fellow historian. It uses cutting-edge AI to transform manuscript images into accurate, searchable plain text.

Leo invites applications for the Leo Transcription Grant, which offers up to 100,000 free credits, sufficient to transcribe as many as 200,000 pages of handwritten manuscripts. The grant is open to students, academics, and institutions. The only condition of the award is that grantees publish the images and transcriptions online free of restriction and copyright. Further information and the application form are available at https://blog.tryleo.ai/2025/09/05/leo-transcription-grant-2025/.

UPCOMING CONFERENCE
The Canadian War Museum Conference 2025: Oral History and the Veterans’ Experience will be held from Thursday, October 2 to Sunday, October 5, 2025 at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa. This ground-breaking conference, one of the first to focus on the growing interest in the post-service veteran experience, will provide a forum for historians, veterans, military community members, and others to showcase and discuss the latest scholarship surrounding oral history and the effects of military service after the return to civilian life.

Conference keynote speakers will include Dr. Michael Petrou, the Museum’s Historian, Veterans’ Experience, as well as Dr. Tim Cook, the Museum’s Chief Historian and Director of Research. 

The event will also feature over 20 experts and veterans from across Canada presenting research grouped into six panels. 

• Using Veterans’ Oral Histories in Museums and Universities examines the use of veterans’ oral histories in museums and universities, focusing on innovative projects that preserve and share the experiences of military personnel and their families.
• The Bonds of Veteranhood After Uncelebrated Missions explores the bonds formed among veterans of missions and units that have been forgotten, overlooked, or tarnished by scandal.
• Personal Impacts of Military Service is a bilingual conversation about how veterans are shaped by their service in the armed forces, touching on veteran reintegration into civilian life and the lasting effects of military service.
• Veteranhood and Veterans’ Communities examines veteranhood as it is experienced collectively — shaping not just individuals, but communities and the place of veterans within them.
• Military Testimony and the Arts explores how some veterans use art to communicate their experiences. This panel will draw attention to creative works that reflect on the realities of military life, post-traumatic stress disorder, and war.
• Recognizing, Compensating, and Accepting Veteranhood examines the relationship — both historical and contemporary — between veterans and the government, and between veterans and wider Canadian society.

RAF MUSEUM EVENT

AWARD COMPETITION
The RAF Museum is delighted to announce that it is again sponsoring a series of academic awards designed to inspire and reward high-quality research by up and coming scholars. Applications which consider the historiography of the RAF are particularly welcomed.

The awards are not, however, confined to works focused on the RAF and are open to students whose studies will further the Museum’s knowledge in relevant areas of archaeology, international relations, strategic studies, law and ethics, museology or air power. Works which help expand knowledge of operational conditions, adversaries or the context of the RAF’s history are also eligible.

Applications open on Friday 3 July 2025 for the RAF Museum’s:
PhD Bursary (£3,000)
Masters Prize (£350)
Undergraduate Prize (£250)
Applications close on Friday 24 October 2025.

If you are considering applying or have questions regarding your eligibility then you are warmly encouraged to email the Museum’s Historian and Academic Access Manager Dr Megan Kelleher (megan.kelleher@rafmuseum.org) for an informal discussion of the awards.

To apply for one of this year’s academic awards, please download the appropriate documents below from our website: https://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/news/raf-museum-academic-awards-2025-2/.

The prizes are granted on the recommendation of a selection panel consisting of the following members of the Museum’s Research Advisory Board.

Seb Cox OBE (Chair, RAF Museum Research Advisory Board)
Dr Sophy Antrobus (King’s College London)
Dr Maria Burczynska (King's College London)
Professor Richard Morris (University of Huddersfield)

ESSAY COMPETITION
For the twenty-first consecutive year, the John A. Adams ’71 Center for Military History & Strategic Analysis at Virginia Military Institute, Lexington, Virginia, will award prizes for the best unpublished papers on Cold War military history. The contest promotes innovative scholarship from rising (early to mid-career) scholars on Cold War subjects.

Any aspect of the Cold War (1945-1991) era is eligible, including papers on military strategy, plans, and operations; the relationship between the armed forces and society; international security affairs; Cold War alliances; and the connections between Cold War military history and contemporary geopolitical challenges. The essay may embrace a U.S. or global focus.

Prizes: First prize will earn a plaque and a cash award of $2,000; second prize, $1,000 and a plaque; and third prize, $500 and a plaque.

Procedures: Submissions are due electronically to the Adams Center at Virginia Military Institute by Friday, October 17th, 2025. Please format your submission as a Microsoft Word document and limit your essay to a maximum of 7,500 words (minimum 4,000 words) of double-spaced text, exclusive of documentation and bibliography. A panel of judges will examine all papers; the Adams Center Director will announce the winners in December 2025. The first-prize winning essay will appear in The Journal of Military History.

Submissions to: adamscenter@vmi.edu
 
Questions to:
Dr. Joel C. Christenson
Director, John A. Adams ’71 Center for Military History & Strategic Analysis
Department of History
Virginia Military Institute
Lexington, VA 24450
christensonjc@vmi.edu

NEW ARCHIVAL RESOURCE
Sam Johnson Vietnam Archive Opens Large Agent Orange Collection

Public perceptions about the Vietnam War remain filled with many myths, conspiracies, and misunderstandings, and the use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War has had a lasting impact on Vietnam and on veterans. The Agent Orange Product Liability Litigation served as a widescale attempt by both plaintiffs and defendants to find answers such as whether the government and/or chemical companies were aware of Agent Orange’s toxicity before using it and who would be liable for damages caused by Agent Orange.  This landmark class action suit (1979-1984) brought together many of the individual suits filed by Vietnam veterans against these chemical companies claiming that their product caused numerous health issues for themselves and their children. 

The Agent Orange Product Liability Litigation Collection, housed at the Sam Johnson Vietnam Archive, contains 550 linear feet of scientific studies, trial records, military documents about Agent Orange use, copies of case law relevant to the class action suit, and over 200 linear feet of deposition transcripts and exhibits from government officials, chemical company employees, representative plaintiffs and relevant expert witnesses who discuss a wide range of Agent Orange and dioxin related topics. 

By processing and making this collection available for research, the Vietnam Center & Sam Johnson Vietnam Archive is providing previously unavailable information and insight into one of the most controversial programs during the war – the use of chemical defoliants – and the long-term impact of their use on human health and the environment. This collection appeals to a wide range of audiences including veterans, legal scholars, scientists, medical professionals, historians, and students.  Given the ongoing public and academic interest in the Vietnam War, it is very exciting to provide everyone with access to a new set of documents that can help shed light on such a controversial and impactful topic.

To learn more about the materials, which were processed through a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, click on the link to view the collection’s finding aid. 

https://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/virtualarchive/items.php?item=26520000000

These materials are not available online and can only be viewed in person in our reading room on the Texas Tech University campus, or you can order photocopies through our reference service if you cannot visit.  If you would like to access these materials, email us at vnca@ttu.edu for help planning your visit or to request copies.

SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITY
10th MOUNTAIN DIVISION
CHARLES A. and LOYOLA M. MURPHY ENDOWED SCHOLARSHIP FOR THE STUDY OF MILITARY HISTORY

The 10th Mountain Division Foundation, Inc. (the Foundation) has established the Charles A. and Loyola M. Murphy Endowed Scholarship for the Study of Military History to promote development of a broad understanding of military mountaineering or skiing history and contributions of the WWII Mountain Troopers within the American national experience. This historical knowledge can be an invaluable tool for the decision-making process in many professional fields.

WHAT: This scholarship provides a maximum of one $5,000 cash award annually to one selected doctoral candidate or graduate level student with high academic qualifications who is beginning or currently pursuing post graduate study in military history, U.S. history, international relations, or a related field.  The focus of study must directly relate to the U.S. Army’s 10th Mountain Division and affiliated units, from 1941 through the current active-duty actions, or to the post WWII contributions of these soldiers.  The award will help pay for expenses related to the costs of education, research, travel, and the purchase of books or other educational materials, as administered by the academic institution within the limits of applicable law and program limitations.

WHO: This scholarship is available for post graduate level scholars (Masters, Specialist or Doctoral level) having been accepted to or currently attending accredited universities or colleges in the United States, or solely at the discretion of the Foundation, distinguished universities or colleges abroad.  No historical or biological ties to any previous or current 10th Mountain Division soldier are required.

HOW: Students desiring to compete for the Charles A. and Loyola M. Murphy Endowed Scholarship for the Study of Military History to be awarded for study beginning in the coming fall, should submit a letter of application to the Foundation at the address noted on the application packet.

APPLICATION: Applications must be received no later than July 15th and include the following information:

• Completed application form.
• University presently attending or to which application has been made and the current status of that application (acceptance into an accredited program is a condition of any award).
• Copy of student’s personal and academic biography in your own words (limit to one printed page at 10 point font, please).
• A statement from the applicant that includes an outline of that proposed education program, the degree objective, major of study, and proposed thesis, dissertation or capstone project topic.   (Include the degree to be earned, department or college, etc.)
• A copy of all official college/university undergraduate and post-graduate transcripts.
• A statement not to exceed 1000 words concerning the relationship of the Tenth Mountain Division History Scholarship to the applicant's field of study and the value to be derived both by the individual and the general public.
• Upon acceptance into an accredited program, it is required that the thesis advisor, department chair or dissertation committee chair contact information be added to this packet.

• Relevance of the chosen area of study to contributions by the soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division.
• Academic ability including baccalaureate record.
• Viability of a publishable final paper, dissertation, thesis or capstone project on the impact of the 10th Mountain Division soldiers on the field of study.  Publication of a final paper is not a requirement for this scholarship, but it is expressly stated that a courtesy copy of any relevant final paper, dissertation, thesis or capstone project will be provided to the Foundation to be placed on file with the Tenth Mountain Division Resource Center in Denver, Colorado for reference by future generations. All publication rights will remain with the scholar.  

CALL FOR WRITERS
The Edwin Mellen Press We are looking to increase our current pool of authors at The Edwin Mellen Press in the discipline of Military related studies. We are a non-subsidy academic publisher of scholarly books in the humanities and social sciences. Our sole criterion for publication is that a manuscript makes a contribution to scholarship. We publish monographs, critical editions, collections, translations, revisionist studies, constructive essays, bibliographies, dictionaries, reference guides and dissertations.

Mellen Press has published over 10,000 works in numerous disciplines, including military subjects of a scholarly nature. We publish 300 scholarly works a year. We offer recognition awards (for superior scholarship), royalties, authors maintain copyright, peer reviews and we have a world wide distribution network of libraries and direct sales. For submissions we are looking for scholarly works on a wide variety of Military issues and topics.
Please tell us about your work by emailing us at editor@mellenpress.com. Including your phone number will also be helpful. We will get back to you in 7 business days or less. For more information, please contact: Edwin. Mellen Press Philip Viverito/ Editor/Direct editor@mellenpress.com
www.mellpress.com

SEEKING TRANSCRIBERS
Project CHECO: The Air Force Experience in Vietnam" (https://airforcehistory.net) seeks to textually digitize a semi-curated collection of documents held at the Air Force archive. It also supports research into the correlation between demographics and crowdsourcing effectiveness.

The Air Force created Project CHECO (Contemporary Historical Examination of Current Operations) in 1962 to analyze issues of immediate concern to various echelons of the service. Over the course of fifteen years, authors completed more than 250 reports on topics that included special operations, conventional air operations, rules of engagement, training, air base defense, and many others. Arguably, the Project CHECO reports represent the single-most comprehensive collection of Air Force-produced documents detailing its activities in the Vietnam War. The vast majority of these have been declassified and approved for public release, and only the publicly-available studies are being used for this project.

For the volunteer, this is a trifecta of opportunities: A chance to learn about U.S. Air Force history in Southeast Asia from the perspective of the service itself; contribute to digital history through the textual digitization of a portion of the USAF archive (similar to efforts by NARA, LOC, and the Smithsonian); and, last but not least, help me gather data for my dissertation!

The process is simple:
1. Fill out a demographic form (individual identities will not be associated with performance)
2. Review some directions for the site.
3. Correct or transcribe a document from the Air Force archive.
4. Take a survey.

THAT'S IT! If you have any questions, please contact me at dabyrd4@gmail.com. Thanks, Dave

SUBMISSIONS SOUGHT
Joint Force Quarterly seeks history submissions for its “Recall” Section
 
Joint Force Quarterly, published by the National Defense University Press, is looking for articles of 2,500 - 5,000 words or less for its Recall section.  Recall focuses on historical issues often of contemporary relevance to the joint force.   JFQ is the Chairman's joint military and security studies journal designed to inform and educate national security professionals on joint and integrated operations; whole of government contributions to national security policy and strategy; homeland security; and developments in training and joint military education to better equip America's military and security apparatus to meet tomorrow's challenges while protecting freedom today.  Instructions for submission of articles is at: http://ndupress.ndu.edu/SubmitaManuscript.aspx.  Any questions can be sent to JFQ1@ndu.edu.