Institute for the Study of the American West

Stephen Aron PhD, Executive Director, Institute for the Study of the American West.

Library and Research Services includes the Autry Library and Braun Research Library and provides researchers with access to the marvelous collections of the Autry National Center.

Publications and Scholarship edits the books produced by the Autry National Center, as well as our new magazine, Convergence. This department also develops links between the Autry and academia, as exemplified by the presence of Professor Virginia Scharff, who holds our Women of the West Chair.

Programs assembles the astonishing variety of lectures, workshops, symposia, plays, concerts, film series, artist demonstrations, and family festivals that augment the exhibitions and galleries of the Museum of the American West and the Southwest Museum of the American Indian. Western History Workshops.

Together, the three departments make the Institute a unique entity that stimulates exciting scholarship and disseminates it to a broad audience.

Stephen Aron
Executive Director
Institute for the Study of the American West

2008 Butcher Scholar Award Winner

The Autry National Center Institute for the Study of the American West has chosen Karen McNeill as recipient of the Butcher Scholar Award for 2008 for work on a biography of the celebrated architect, Julia Morgan. McNeill is an Architectural Historian at Carey & Co., Inc., in San Francisco and a recent doctoral graduate from University of California, Berkeley. Her ambitious interdisciplinary project brings together women’s history, biography, and labor history for an in-depth look at a pioneering woman architect. 

The Butcher Award will allow McNeill to complete important and new research on Julia Morgan’s commissions within the San Francisco Bay area Chinese community. 

Established in 2001 by the Women of the West Museum, the Butcher Scholar Award honors the vision, leadership, and generosity of Jane and Charlie Butcher. Each year, this award supports the work of a promising scholar or artist whose project demonstrates innovation and creativity. The award carries a stipend of up to $5,000.

Announcing the Annual
$10,000 Maverick Prize

The Institute for the Study of the American West at the Autry National Center invites nominations for the MAVERICK PRIZE—an annual award to recognize the work of an individual or organization that challenges conventional wisdom and prompts truly novel thinking about the past, present, and future of the American West.  The winner of this prize will receive $10,000 and an invitation to present the work at the Autry National Center.

To nominate, please send a brief statement (no more than 300 words) about your nominee (can be yourself or your organization) to: editor@autrynationalcenter.org. 

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