Chris Abernathy received a BA in history from Delta State University in 1993 and an MA in history from the University of Alabama in 1999.  His writing project at the University of Alabama was “Blanch Kelso Bruce: Slave, Senator, Assimilationist,” a biographical study of Blanche K. Bruce, the first African American to serve a full term in the United States Senate.  In 1998 Mr. Abernathy received a JD from the University Of Mississippi School Of Law where he served as the Editor-in-Chief of the Law Review. After practicing law for ten years in Mississippi, Tennessee, and Oklahoma, Mr. Abernathy joined the PhD program at OU.  He is working with Prof. Sterling Evans on a history of cannabis as a fiber crop in the United States.  His fields are the West, early United States, and colonial Latin America.

abernathychris@ou.edu