Hayden Nelson

BIO

Hayden Nelson is an environmental historian of the North American West and its borderlands. He joined the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point in 2026 after earning his Ph.D. from the University of Kansas in 2025. He has also taught at the University of Central Missouri and worked as a research historian at the Minnesota Historical Society. At UWSP, he teaches courses in modern U.S. history and public and digital history.

RESEARCH INTERESTS

  • Capitalism and Extractive Industries
  • Environmental History
  • History of Forests and Conservation
  • Indigenous History
  • North American West and its Borderlands
  • Political Economy and Resource Use
  • Public and Digital History
  • Wisconsin and the Midwest

PUBLICATIONS

The North Woods: An Environmental History (monograph in progress).

(with William Convery) “‘The Most Distant of Your Children’: Mni Sota Makoce in the Revolutionary Era,” Minnesota History (accepted, scheduled for publication in Winter 2026-2027 volume).

“Ruby Scofield Doyle: A Mother, Her Diary, and Her World on a Montana Sheep Ranch, 1922-1923,” Montana: The Magazine of Western History (accepted, scheduled for publication in Winter 2026-2027 volume).

“Stealing Christmas: An Environmental History of America’s Most Iconic Tree,” Germinate: Environmental History Review Special Issue: December (accepted, scheduled for publication in December 2026).

“The Past, Present, and Future of Forest Fires,” in Tracking the Effects: Environmental History and the Current United States Federal Administration, Network in Canadian History and Environment, June 13, 2026.

“From In‘zhúje‘waxóbe to Big Red Rock: Confronting the Settler Colonial Past and Present of Lawrence, Kansas,” in Shokhí: A Kanza Relative, a Monument, and Rematriation,C. Huffman, Tai S. Edwards, and Jay T. Johnson, eds. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2026).

“The Colonization of Montana’s Milk River Valley, 1879-1889,” The Missouri, America’s Longest River: A Cultural and Environmental History, Jon K. Lauck and Harry F. Thompson, eds. (Sioux Falls: Center for Western Studies / Augustana University Press, 2026).

“Smoke from their Fires; Or, Environment and Region in Canada and the Upper Midwest,” Middle West Review Special Issue: Regional Geography(ies) of the Midwest 11, no. 1 (Fall 2024): 89-111. https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/mwr.2024.a937619

PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS

  • American Historical Association
  • American Society for Environmental History
  • Canadian Historical Association
  • Forest History Association of Wisconsin
  • Forest History Society
  • Midwestern History Association
  • National Council on Public History
  • Native American and Indigenous Studies Association
  • Network in Canadian History and Environment
  • Western History Association

BEST ADVICE

“What one begs the American people to do, for all our sakes, is simply to accept our history.” -James Baldwin, 1965

LAST BOOK READ?

Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World by Mike Davis

FAVORITE QUOTE

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.” -John Muir

FUN FACT

When he was growing up, he wanted to be a history professor since the 6th grade. That was, of course, after he realized he did not possess the abilities to play for the Brewers or Packers!