Marla Miller, Associate Dean for Strategic Initiatives and Distinguished Professor of History, Receives St Botolph's Distinguished Artist Award

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It’s not every day a writer of historical nonfiction is honored with the St. Botolph Foundation's Distinguished Artist Award.

The Foundation has been recognizing New England-based writers, musicians, and visual artists since 1963, but Marla Miller, Associate Dean for Strategic Initiatives of the College of Humanities and Fine Arts and Distinguished Professor of History, is the first writer to be recognized in her genre.

“I'm over the moon to have received this recognition, and to be on any list with Richard Wilbur and Elizabeth Bishop,” Miller said. “Helping readers connect with the people and places of the past depends a good bit on an author's ability to bring
unknown worlds to life in ways that feel both familiar and surprising, and I've been fortunate to have, across the whole of my education and career, mentors, models, and peers whose dedication to the craft of writing is deep, and infectious.”

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Prof. Marla Miller's book, Betsy Ross and the Making of America, was singled out for praise by the St. Botolph Foundation.

According to the St. Botolph’s Club Foundation website, the award is presented annually to mid and late-career artists who have “demonstrated outstanding talent and an exceptional diversity of accomplishments and who has also made substantial contributions as a teacher, mentor or advocate.” The awardees alternate between practitioners in the fields of music, literature and the visual arts. Past honorees include Ann Beattie (2022, short fiction); E.O. Wilson, (2013, biologist, theorist, naturalist & writer); Annie Dillard (1988, author), and the poets Richard Wilbur (1983) and Elizabeth Bishop (1974).

In the citation for Miller’s award, the Boston-based Foundation noted that historian Douglas Brinkley described Miller’s 2010 biography, Betsy Ross and the Making of America, as “a stupendous literary achievement.”