Martha Hodes is pro­fes­sor of his­to­ry at New York Uni­ver­si­ty. She is the author of the award-win­ning books Mourn­ing Lin­coln; The Sea Captain’s Wife: A True Sto­ry of Love, Race, and War in the Nine­teenth Cen­tu­ry; and White Women, Black Men: Illic­it Sex in the Nine­teenth-Cen­tu­ry South. She has pre­sent­ed her schol­ar­ship around the world and is the recip­i­ent of fel­low­ships from the Guggen­heim Foun­da­tion, the Nation­al Endow­ment for the Human­i­ties, the Charles War­ren Cen­ter at Har­vard Uni­ver­si­ty, the Whit­ing Foun­da­tion, and the Cull­man Cen­ter for Schol­ars and Writ­ers at the New York Pub­lic Library.