U of U Professor and Grad Student Win Third Award for Historical Book

W. Paul Reeve, professor of History and Simmons Chair of Mormon Studies, and co-authors Christopher Rich and LaJean Purcell Carruth, were recently awarded the Utah Historical Society’s Best Book in Utah History for This Abominable Slavery: Race, Religion, and the Battle over Human Bondage in Antebellum Utah. The book traces a series of debates in the 1852 Utah legislative session over the legal status of African American and Native American slaves in Utah Territory as well as a territorial election bill.

Says Reeve, “I have been caught off guard by such a positive reception for the book, especially among scholars outside of the Utah Studies community. The narrative that my coauthors and I tell situates Utah Territory within a regional and national framework in the 1850s, a divisive decade that culminated in a bloody civil war by 1861. The fact that three highly regarded historical associations noticed this effort and chose to reward it with their respective best book prizes, is gratifying beyond belief.”

This Abominable Slavery has garnered two prior awards; the Mormon History Association’s Ken Demas Best Book Award in Mormon History (June 2025) and the Western History Association’s Caughey Western History Prize for the most distinguished book on the history of the American West (October 2025).

Dean Wanda Pillow says, “The College of Humanities is thrilled for our colleague Paul and his co-authors to receive such well-deserved recognition for this book. This Abominable Slavery: Race, Religion, and the Battle over Human Bondage in Antebellum Utah is a significant contribution to the field of U.S. history and to public understanding of the intersections of race, religion, and legislation. Thie book is an exemplar of thorough research and the culmination of many years of hard work. Congratulations, Paul!”

Reeve, Rich, and Carruth wrote the book based on what Reeve describes as “a flood of newly available primary sources” that he uncovered during his research for an earlier book. Carruth, a senior historian at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and an expert in transcribing nineteenth and early-twentieth century documents, transcribed the reports of the 1852 legislative session from Pitman shorthand, making them available for scholarly inquiry for the first time since their creation over a century and a half ago.

Reeve and Rich, a history PhD student at the University of Utah, gathered the transcribed speeches and analyzed them in context with primary sources from the Utah State Archives and Utah Historical Society. This research formed the foundation for This Abominable Slavery.

Many of these sources are now available to the public thanks to a collaboration between the J. Willard Marriott Library and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Many congratulations to our colleagues for this award!