Yarmouth History Center is proud to announce the winners of the 2021 Wellcome Prize for Student Historians. First prize in the paper competition went to Ava Jutras, a junior at Yarmouth High School, for her paper analyzing the life and times of local anti-suffragist Harriet Bird. Leyi Li, a student at North Yarmouth Academy, earned second prize for her paper about the assimilation and rejuvenation of the Franco-American community in Maine and Nathanel Peretz, also a senior student at NYA, won third prize for his paper about Holocaust survivors in Maine. Maddy Corson, a senior at Yarmouth High School, won first prize in the film competition for her investigation of the environmental history of the Royal River.
This year’s winners presented their research and findings in a Zoom program on Tuesday, November 16. Find links to their papers and films below:
Ava Jutras, Harriet Bird: Examining a Female Anti-Suffragist
Leyi Li, Coming Full Circle: the Assimilation and Rejuvenation of the Franco-American Spirit in Maine
Nathanel Peretz, The Unspeakable Memories Never Fade, Not Even in Maine
Maddy Corson: Four Falls: A Brief History and Environmental Inquiry
The Wellcome Prize is Yarmouth History Center’s student history competition, which is open to high school students in Maine. Students are invited to undertake original historical research about a local history topic related to Cumberland County and write a research paper or make a film about their findings. Entries are judged on the quality of research and presentation and winners are invited to share their findings with the public as part of the History Center’s fall lecture series. More information about the prize is available here.
