While many know him as the explorer of the Hudson River and Hudson Bay, which are named for him, no one really knows much about the life – and death – of the great 17th-century North American explorer Henry Hudson.
Peter C. Mancall, professor of history and anthropology at the University of Southern California, will examine the life, legacy and mystery of Hudson and discuss his recent book, Fatal Journey: The Final Expedition of Henry Hudson — A Tale of Mutiny and Murder in the Arctic (Basic Books, 2009) on Monday, Oct. 12, at 4:10 p.m. in Wilson Hall, Room 126, at Vanderbilt University. A book signing will follow the lecture.
Hudson explored the region around modern New York City while looking for a western route to the Orient under the auspices of the Dutch East India Company. Timed to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the English mariner’s last voyage, Mancall’s book recounts the puzzling episode of a captain overthrown by an enraged faction of his own crew.
Mancall is also associate vice provost for research advancement at USC, and the director of the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute. He is the author of four books, including Hakluyt’s Promise: An Elizabethan’s Obsession for an English America (Yale, 2007) and Deadly Medicine: Indians and Alcohol in Early America (Cornell, 1995). He is also writing American Origins, which will be volume one of the Oxford History of the United States.
Mancall is a historian of early America, the early modern Atlantic world, and early Native American Indian history (c. 1492-1840) and an elected member of the American Antiquarian Society. He received his B.A. in history from Oberlin College and his Ph.D. from Harvard.
The lecture is sponsored by the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities. The Warren Center promotes interdisciplinary research and study in the humanities, social sciences, and, when appropriate, natural sciences. For more information about the Warren Center, visit http://www.vanderbilt.edu/rpw_center/center.htm.
Media Contact: Missy Pankake, (615) 322-NEWS
missy.pankake@vanderbilt.edu