David J. Weber-Clements Center Prize


The WHA announces the David J. Weber-Clements Center Prize given annually for the best non-fiction book on Southwestern America. The competition will be open to any non-fiction book, including biography, on any aspect of Southwestern life, past or present with a 2019 copyright. The purpose of the prize is to promote fine writing and original research on the American Southwest. The author will receive $2500 and an invitation to give the annual Weber-Clements Prize Lecture at Southern Methodist University. 


All submissions must have a 2019 publication date. Presses should submit nominations and a copy of the book to each member of the award committee listed below. While the formal process requires presses/journals to submit the work of their authors, the WHA strongly recommends that authors check with the award committee chair a week before the deadline to see if they received a copy of their work.

-2020 Awards Cycle opens January 25, 2020

-2020 Award Submission (Postmark) Deadline: April 15, 2020


The WHA office sends award notifications in August. View past recipients.


Gary Clayton Anderson, Chair

University of Oklahoma

455 West Lindsey
Norman, OK 73019
gcanderson@ou.edu


Emily Lutenski

St Louis University

Department of American Studies 
Saint Louis University 
3800 Lindell Blvd., 131 Adorjan Hall

Saint Louis, MO 63108

emily.lutenski@slu.edu


Steven Hackel
 University of California, Riverside

UCR Department of History
900 University Ave.
HMNSS 1212
Riverside, CA 92521

steven.hackel@ucr.edu

Weber and Clements

In 2011, the Western History Association Council and the Clements Center agreed to sponsor a new book prize to be administered by the WHA. The David J. Weber-Clements Prize for the Best Non-Fiction Book on Southwestern America was presented for the first time at the 2012 WHA conference. The prize originated as the William P. Clements Prize for the Best Non-Fiction Book on Southwestern America, where it has been awarded by the Center since 1999. William P. Clements, Jr., who passed away in May 2011, was the Governor of Texas and the founding benefactor of the Center. The prize honors both Governor Clements and the Center's Founding Director and past WHA President, David J. Weber, who passed away in August 2010. 

Past Recipients

2019 | Matthew Sakiestewa Gilbert, Hopi Runners: Crossing the Terrain between Indian and American (University Press of Kansas, 2018)

2018 | Julian Lim for Porous Borders: Multiracial Migrations and the Law in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands (University of North Carolina Press, 2017)

2017 | David Wallace Adams for Three Roads to Magdalena: Coming of Age in a Southwest Borderland, 1890-1990 (University Press of Kansas, 2016)

2016 | Andrew Torget for Seeds of Empire: Cotton, Slavery, and the Transformation of the Texas Borderlands, 1800-1850 (University of North Carolina Press)

2015 | Andrew Needham for Power Lines: Phoenix and the Making of the Modern Southwest  (Princeton University Press, 2014)

Return to Awards


Western History Association

UNO History Department

6001 Dodge Street

Omaha, NE 68182   (402) 554-5999

wha@westernhistory.org 



The WHA is hosted on the campus of the University of Nebraska at Omaha and benefits from the generous support of the College of Arts and Sciences and UNO Department of History. The Western History Association is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.