The Cumberland University Papers of Martin Van Buren Project has hired six paid summer interns, thanks to a grant from the Watson-Brown Foundation. The six students, two graduate and four undergraduate, represent four universities.

The interns will be working on a variety of tasks over the summer months, including research on Van Buren’s time as New York attorney general; transcriptions and annotations of documents for the first print volume of Van Buren’s papers; and a day-to-day timeline of Van Buren’s life.

Project Director Mark Cheathem is thankful to have the ability to hire dedicated students to help with the project.

“Having interns work with us for a second summer in a row will be a real boon to the project,” said Cheathem. “Last year’s interns helped us make significant strides on advancing the project, and I have no doubt that we will see similar progress this summer.”

The Summer 2019 interns are:

Candace Jackson Gray (Morgan State University)

Jack Grobe (University at Albany, SUNY)

Natalie Hershey (Cumberland University)

Paige Hrobsky (Cumberland University)

Thomas Hudson (Tennessee Tech University)

Charles Ware (Cumberland University)

The Papers of Martin Van Buren is a joint digital/print project that will make accessible approximately 13,000 documents belonging to the eighth president. The editors expect to make Van Buren’s papers available on the freely accessible website hosted at VanBurenPapers.org. When completed, this website will contain Van Buren’s transcribed papers. While the project is ongoing, the editors will periodically update the website with new documents. The papers will also be available in a four-volume print edition of Van Buren’s most important political documents, to be published by the University of Tennessee Press.

By transcribing Van Buren’s papers, including his letters, speeches, notes, and miscellaneous material, this project will provide fresh insight into the founding of the Democratic party, the evolution of formal politics between the War of 1812 and the Civil War, and the changes in political culture that occurred during Van Buren’s lifetime. Additionally, it will help scholars, students, and the public understand the maturation of United States politics during its early development.

The Papers of Martin Van Buren project is sponsored by Cumberland University and the National Historical Publications and Records Commission and is produced in partnership with the Center for Digital Editing at the University of Virginia.