Hamilton College Professor Wins $300,000 History Award

An Associate Professor at Hamilton College is one of nine educators who has won the 2025 Dan David Prize, the world's largest history prize.

Associate Professor of History Mackenzie Cooley was  awarded $300,000 for a contribution to the study of the human past, and to support future endeavors in history.

“The Prize selection committee was impressed by the originality, reach and ambition of Cooley’s archival research across the former Spanish Empire and by her incorporation of indigenous languages and knowledge systems into a study of European science and experience,” according to the Dan David Prize committee.

Cooley is a historian of science and medicine in the early modern Hispanic world and director of Latin American & Latine Studies at Hamilton.  The Prize is awarded to early and midcareer researchers whose work illuminates the human past in bold and creative ways.

Following an open nomination process, winners are selected by a global committee of experts that changes annually. This year’s selection committee members are affiliated with leading academic institutions including the University of Toronto, the Cyprus Institute, and the University of Cambridge.

Quoting the Dan David Prize release, “Combining the history of science and environmental history, Cooley’s work explores how humans have shaped, classified and extracted knowledge from nature - and, in so doing, redefined their own bodies, societies and empires. Her first book, The Perfection of Nature (2022), reveals how Renaissance breeding practices shaped ideas of race, human potential and dominion over animals. Her current research explores ‘bioprospecting’ - the quest to harness nature for human health and medicine.”

The Dan David Prize was first established in 2001 by the late entrepreneur and philanthropist Dan David, to reward innovative and interdisciplinary work that contributed to humanity. It is endowed by the Dan David Foundation and headquartered at Tel Aviv University.