Emory News recently featured history and business double major Leah Wang among a select group of Emory’s exceptional student-athletes. Wrapping up her junior year at Emory, Wang has been a leader on the pitch, throughout campus, and beyond. She testified before the U.S. congress about Title IX, was selected for the NCAA Division III Student Immersion Program, and served as the founder and president of the Asian and Pacific Islander Student-Athlete group. Find a quote from the feature about Wang below, and read the all the profiles of the featured student-athletes: “How Emory athletes find the Eagle Edge.”
“Balancing my commitments and social life has been challenging, but I’ve been able to maintain strong academic performance, continue to grow as an athlete and build meaningful friendships along the way,” Wang says. “It’s still a work in progress, but I’ve learned to stay grounded and appreciate the opportunities I have.”
In December the U.S. Senate passed a bill to extend by four years the work of the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Review Board. The nonpartisan group is appointed by the U.S. president and dedicated to investigate and release federal records relating to unsolved, racially-motivated murders from the civil rights era (1940-1979). With bipartisan support, the bill now heads to the U.S. House of Representatives.
The cold cases project has strong ties to Emory College and the Emory History Department. Professor Hank Klibanoff, Associated Faculty in History, is co-chair of the review board. Klibanoff directs the Georgia Civil Rights Cold Cases Project (to which multiple History students have contributed) and is the creator and host of the award-winning podcast Buried Truths.
“What we are doing is simply trying to, you know, excavate the records and get them released, review them, review them with the FBI, review them with the Department of Justice, review them with the National Archive,” said Emory University Professor Hank Klibanoff, a co-chair for the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Review Board.
The Emory History Department mourns the death of Rosalyn Page, who served as the department administrator for more than 25 years before her retirement in 2008. Becky Herring, current department administrator, writes that Rosalyn was “not only a patient and encouraging mentor, she was also a loyal and supportive friend. Her fun-loving spirit, joyful nature, and kind heart will be greatly missed by her loving family and cherished friends.” A funeral service will be held on Thursday, March 12, 2026, at 1:30 pm in Glenn Memorial UMC’s Little Chapel at Emory University in Atlanta. In remembrance, consider a donation to WABE or Friends of Disabled Adults and Children.
Rosalyn’s obituary, chronicling her rich life and character, follows:
Rosalyn Florence Page, beloved mother, sister, aunt and cherished friend, passed away peacefully in Tucker, Georgia, on February 16, 2026, at the age of 82, surrounded by her family and those she held dear.
Born on April 25, 1943, in Sapulpa, Oklahoma, Rosalyn was the first daughter of Joe E. Page and Cora Jane Page. She spent her childhood in Bristow, Oklahoma, and later in Englewood, Colorado, where she developed the curiosity, independence, and love of learning that would shape her life. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Colorado State University, an accomplishment she carried with pride.
Rosalyn married Mike Phillips, and together they raised two children while living in Colorado, Kansas, and ultimately Stone Mountain, Georgia. Whether substitute teaching, cheering at countless ball games or savoring summer camping, Rosalyn poured her heart into the moment. Her devotion to her children was unwavering, and she nurtured them with the same warmth, humor, and optimism she offered to everyone she met.
She retired in 2008 from Emory University in Atlanta, where she served for more than 25 years as an Academic Department Administrator in the History Department. Rosalyn found fulfillment in her work, forming lasting friendships with colleagues and students who admired her intelligence, steadiness, and generous spirit.
A woman of many passions, Rosalyn was a longtime member of Glenn Memorial Methodist Church and an enthusiastic participant in the Atlanta Cajun Zydeco Association, where she embraced her love of dance and community. Known for her cheery smile, kindness, and unwaveringly positive outlook, she had a remarkable ability to make others feel seen, valued, and loved — and she never let them forget it.
Rosalyn was a lifelong reader with an insatiable thirst for knowledge, a talented cook and patient seamstress. She was a dedicated student of the French language, enjoyed yoga and genealogy. She was a treasured friend to all who knew her. Her presence brought light, laughter, and comfort, and her absence will be felt deeply.
She is survived by her daughter Lisa Phillips (Mike Owens) of Brevard, North Carolina; her son Trace A. Phillips (Jen Moran) of Edwards, Colorado; her sister Melissa Page (Hugh Simpson) of Los Lunas, New Mexico; and her former husband Mike Phillips (Susanne Pinkley) of Alpharetta, Georgia. Rosalyn is also remembered with love by many extended family members and countless friends whose lives she touched. Her memory will continue to inspire those who were fortunate enough to know her.
Dr. Crystal R. Sanders, Associate Professor of African American Studies and Associated Faculty in the History Department, recently contributed analysis to the article: “Stevie Wonder’s Battle for MLK Day and the New Challenges to King’s Legacy.” Sanders helps to chronicle the critical role that prominent figures like Wonder played in securing the establishment of the federal holiday for Martin Luther King, Jr., which was signed into law in 1983. Sanders also offers fascinating analysis of the struggle to get the holiday observed on state and local levels, including in her hometown of Clayton, North Carolina (see more on this below). A specialist in the twentieth-century history of the U.S., Sanders is the author, most recently, of the multiple prize-winning book A Forgotten Migration: Black Southerners, Segregation Scholarships, and the Debt Owed to Public HBCUs (UNC Press, 2024).
Read an excerpt from the Capital B News article below and find the full piece here.
“Whether we’re talking about the local, state, or federal level, it took a lot of maneuvering to get this holiday,” Sanders said.
She grew up in Clayton, a small North Carolina town about 15 or 20 minutes from Raleigh. She recalled how her father, the first Black American elected to the Clayton Town Council, basically had to trick the council into recognizing the holiday, even after North Carolina had adopted it as a state holiday in 1983.
“After several failed attempts at getting the holiday recognized, my father introduced a motion that the town would observe all holidays observed by North Carolina,” she said. “And many of his colleagues didn’t think twice. They voted in the affirmative. Later, during that same meeting, an elderly white man said, ‘Wait, did I just vote for the King holiday?’ And my father said, ‘You most certainly did.’”
Dr. Malinda Maynor Lowery, Emory Cahoon Family Professor of American History and a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina, recently delivered remarks at the fourth installment of the annual Muscogee teach-in. The event brings representatives of the Muscogee Nation, displaced from the site of Emory’s campus in the early 1800s, to campus to teach Muscogee history and culture and to continue fortifying relationships with the Emory community. Since arriving at Emory in 2021, Lowery has been instrumental in building those relationships, including through programming at Emory’s Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies and curricular offerings in the History Department and beyond.
Dr. Thomas D. Rogers, Professor of History with specializations in environmental and labor history, has published a new book with co-author Dr. Jeffrey T. Manuel (Southern Illinois University Edwardsville). Titled Ethanol: A Hemispheric History for the Future of of Biofuels, the book chronicles the transnational history of ethanol in Brazil and the U.S. (the globe’s largest producers). Ethanol, which is Rogers’s third book,offers “the first full picture of the long history of this renewable fuel that from the beginning offered an imperfect alternative to oil.”
Though ethanol, a liquid fuel made from agricultural byproducts, has generated controversy in recent years—good or bad for the environment? a big-ag boon or boondoggle?—its use goes back more than a century. Tracing the little-known history of this promising and contentious fuel, Ethanol: A Hemispheric History for the Future of Biofuels reveals the transnational nature of ethanol’s development by its two biggest producers, the U.S. and Brazil. By drawing the connections between the shifting fortunes of ethanol in these two countries, the book presents the first full picture of the long history of this renewable fuel that from the beginning offered an imperfect alternative to oil.
Though generally presented as parallel stories, the histories of ethanol in the U.S. and Brazil are inextricably linked. Authors Jeffrey T. Manuel and Thomas D. Rogers show how policies in one country shaped those in the other. Brazil patterned its mid-century development on the U.S. model, adopting an automobile- and highway-focused transportation system and a fossil fuel-intensive agricultural sector. U.S. policymakers in turn took note when Brazil responded to the 1970s oil shocks by distributing ethanol nationwide, replacing half of its gasoline consumption. In the 2000s, the nations’ leaders worked together to dramatically expand ethanol production. Today, as a new generation of biofuels meant to power aviation and fight climate change again connects Brazilian and U.S. ethanol, Manuel and Rogers explain how the fuel’s future, like its history, is complicated by technical, scientific, economic, and social questions—about how to calculate carbon emissions, agricultural land use, national security and sovereignty, and the balance between government regulation and market forces. Understanding the future of biofuels demands a reckoning with this extensive, shared history—a reckoning that Manuel and Rogers’s far-reaching, deeply researched book brings into view.
Dr. Clifton Crais, Professor of History, has published his most recent book, The Killing Age: How Violence Made the Modern World, with the University of Chicago Press. Crais foregrounds the role and significance of violence in the development of global capitalism from 1750 to the early 1900s, arguing that the period commonly described as the Anthropocene should, instead, best be understood as the Mortecene, or killing age. During this age, he writes, the new “ease and profitability of killing created a disturbing network of global connections and economies, eliminating tens of millions of people and sparking an environmental crisis that remains the most urgent catastrophe facing the world today.”
South African Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee offered the following praise for Crais’s book: “Synoptic in its reach, overwhelming in its detail, The Killing Age leaves one feeling like Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver, who came to prefer the company of peaceable horses to membership of humankind.”
In the Q&A below, Crais gives us a glimpse into the making of the monograph as part of the History Department’s New Books series.
Books are produced over years if not decades. Give us a sense for the lifespan of this book, from initial idea to final edits.
In some respects, The Killing Age returned me to questions I have been interested in since graduate school in the mid-1980s when books by scholars like Immanuel Wallerstein, Eric Wolf and others called attention to the importance of understanding the world economy and the development of capitalism. But it was only about a decade ago when I decided it was time to undertake a new project, partly inspired by a graduate course Mark Ravina and I taught on comparative empire. I became convinced that the literature on the Anthropocene was inadequate or at least incomplete and that, more generally, we had a poor understanding of the role of violence in the development of capitalism and the making of our contemporary world of planetary peril.
The research, writing and publication took about eight years. There was a lot of climate science and environmental history I had to first learn, and I had to decide on which archives I would delve into. I spent lots of time in England, but also many places across the United States. So, it took longer to research and write than previous books. Plus, The Killing Age is hefty, over 700 pages long, plus an associated website, thekillingage.com.
What was the research process like?
The Killing Age was by far the most difficult project I have undertaken. I had never done research in the histories of South America, Asia, and especially the United States. I also relied on multiple databases, some massive. The total amount of data I have stored and used for the project is more than 1 terabyte, in other words more than a million pages. One of the biggest challenges was how to navigate all the material while producing a book that is narratively driven and accessible to the general public. I ended up going through more than a dozen drafts.
Are you partial to a particular chapter or section?
I was originally trained in the history of Africa, so the chapters covering this part of the world had a certain familiarity; not so with other regions, including the United States. I am partial to the section “The American Ways of Killing” that explores the hunting of whales, beaver, and bison and its connections to economic change and the emergence of the US as a global power. Just learning about the entwined histories of humans and non-humans was fascinating, especially as I wrote some of these chapters during COVID-19.
How does this project align with your broad research agenda (past, present, or future)?
The Killing Age is both a kind of culmination and a departure. I have been thinking about many of the issues I explore for decades. At the same time, the project has convinced me of the importance of writing a global history of the twentieth century, about the possibilities of human progress and how these possibilities were so often subverted. In my next project I will be returning to the issue of violence and especially the redemocratization of the means of destruction, particularly after 1945.
Each year Emory’s 40 Under Forty program features a group of innovative alumni creating positive change throughout the world. The 2025 cohort includes two former history majors doing remarkable work in business, law, and academia: Jeremy Evans (09C) and Matthew Kim (10C, 10G).
Read profiles of Evans and Kim published by the Emory 40 Under Forty program below, and browse all the members of this year’s outstanding cohort.
Jeremy Evans 09C is a partner in the Financial Restructuring Group at Paul Hastings LLP, where he advises some of the world’s largest asset managers and hedge funds. He structures complex financing transactions and restructurings across industries and asset classes, approaching challenging situations with creativity and strategic insight to achieve successful outcomes for his clients. Evans studied history and religion and was deeply engaged in campus life.
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A student-athlete, he was a four-year member and three-year captain of the Men’s Golf Team, served on the Varsity Athletic Committee, and was recognized as a Georgia Collegiate Athletic Association All-America Scholar Athlete and University Athletic Association All-Academic honoree. He went on to earn a law degree, graduating magna cum laude from the University of Miami School of Law.
Jeremy has been recognized as a New York Metro Super Lawyers Rising Star, named to the Best Lawyers Ones to Watch list, and honored with the Turnarounds and Workouts “Outstanding Young Restructuring Lawyers” award in 2024.
His time at Emory instilled in him the discipline, perspective, and drive that continue to guide his professional and personal success.
Matthew Kim (10C 10G) is an assistant professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he combines his passions for research, teaching, and public service to shape the development of the law. His scholarship, which focuses on criminal law and civil procedure, has appeared in leading law reviews, including The Ohio State Law Journal, Florida Law Review, and Texas A&M Law Review.
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His academic journey began at Emory College, where he majored in international studies and history, building a strong foundation that informed his graduate and professional studies in law, international relations, political science, and statistics.
Through his teaching and research, Kim continues to explore complex legal questions while mentoring a new generation of lawyers and scholars.
The History Department annually awards its Clio Prizes to the best paper in a Freshman History Seminar and the best research paper in a junior or senior History Colloquium. This year, we are pleased to recognize outstanding work by Emma Rose Ceklosky and William Wainwright.
Ceklosky received the prize for the best paper written in a freshman seminar for her work, “From Exotic Blossoms to Budding Women in Science.” Ceklosky completed this paper in Dr. Judith Miller`s spring 2025 freshman seminar “The World of Jane Austen.” About the course, she writes: “I loved the stories I discovered about horticulture and how it empowered 19th-century women. Dr. Miller’s class brought history to life for me. I recommend her to everyone and am honored that she nominated me for this prize.” Ceklosky plans to double-major in English and Creative Writing and Psychology.
Spring 2025 graduate William Wainwright received the prize for the best research paper written in a history junior/senior colloquium for his work “Recentering the Black Sea,” which he completed in Dr. Michelle Armstrong-Partida`s course “Europe: Merchants-Pirates and the Slave Trade.” Wainwright graduated summa cum laude with a BA in International Relations (highest honors) and History in the spring 2025. Reflecting on the prize and his experience as a major, he writes: “Thank you so much for this. I am honored and grateful to receive this prize. The Emory history department, and Dr. Armstrong-Partida’s class in particular, have been hugely important for my academic development. I look forward to continuing to stay in touch with the professors and staff who have made it possible. Thank you again.”
In the summer of 2025, Emory College senior Lucia Alexeyev conducted research about the relationship between U.S. Naval occupation and residents’ health and access to healthcare on the island of Vieques in Puerto Rico. Alexeyev’s project, titled “Military Occupation and Changing Healthcare Landscapes: Vieques and the U.S. Navy, 1941-2003,” was funded by the History Department’s Cuttino Scholarship for Independent Research Abroad.
Alexeyev is a History major and Global Health, Culture and Society minor. Dr. Jeffrey Lesser, Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of History, serves as her thesis adviser. Read an excerpt from the Nueve Millones piece below and find the full article here.
“Even with how politics has changed in the EPA, Estrada Martinez remains hopeful for the study’s completion. She’s inspired by the Viequense community’s 63-year struggle to remove the Navy from the island, plus an additional 20-year battle to obtain funding for VASAC in the first place. ‘This is just a rock on the road, and we will figure out together how to get rid of it and move forward, right?‘”
