Thai Jones (2011)

Thai Jones won the first Seed Grant while a doctoral candidate in U.S. history at Columbia University. He studies radical social movements, New York City history, and environmental history in the United States. 

His dissertation rediscovered a forgotten conflict between radical anarchists, a liberal mayoral organization, and the Rockefeller family that roiled New York City in 1914—just before the outbreak of World War I. His dissertation was published as More Powerful Than Dynamite: Radicals, Plutocrats, Progressives, and New York’s Year of Anarchy(2014).

Jones is currently the Herbert H. Lehman Curator for U.S. History at Columbia’s Rare Book & Manuscript Library and a lecturer in history. Previously, Jones was an assistant professor of history at Bard College and a reporter for Newsday. His writings have appeared in a variety of national publications, including the New York Times, the Nation, and the Occupied Wall Street Journal. He is now researching Boomtown, a history of labor and the environment in Progressive Era gold-mining communities.