Jim Ambuske, Ph.D.

I tell stories about the American Revolution, Scotland, and the British Atlantic World. I’m also a podcaster and digital humanist specializing in narrative documentary series including Worlds Turned Upside Down, a history of the American Revolution, Intertwined: The Enslaved Community at George Washington’s Mount Vernon, and The Green Tunnel, a hike through the history of the Appalachian Trail. I’m also the former executive producer of Your Most Obedient & Humble Servant and the former host of Conversations at the Washington Library. I hold a Ph.D. in American History from the University of Virginia.

When I’m not behind the mic, I’m working on a book about emigration from Scotland in the era of the American Revolution.

I’m formerly the co-head of R2 Studios, a division of the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media at George Mason University, and former director of the Center for Digital History at George Washington’s Mount Vernon.

My work has benefited from the generosity of the National Endowment for the Humanities, the David Bruce Smith Family Foundation, the Dr. Scholl Foundation, The McCormick Center for the Study of the American Revolution, The John Carter Brown Library, the Virginia American Revolution 250 Commission, Patrick Henry Memorial Foundation, the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture’s Georgian Papers Programme, and the Scholars’ Lab at UVA. Prior to Mount Vernon, I was the Farmer Postdoctoral Fellow in Digital Humanities at the University of Virginia Law Library where I co-directed the 1828 Catalogue Project and the Scottish Court of Session Project.

When not lost in the past, you’ll often find me on the trails with my wife and two future non-historians, trying to perfect a French baguette recipe, or digging in the garden. A wee dram of Scotch whisky is likely.

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