Stanford Historical Society presents 2025 Bartholomew and Schofield awards
The Stanford Historical Society (SHS) celebrated exemplary volunteer service and a crucial oral history project by presenting the Karen Bartholomew Award for Exceptional Service and the Susan W. Schofield Oral History Award at the annual members' meeting on May 28. SHS President Larry Horton presented the awards to David Freyberg in absentia and the Stanford Asian Pacific American Alumni Club (SAPAAC). He also presented certificates of commendation to Jennifer Stonaker and Diego Bustamante.
David Freyberg, the recipient of the 2025 Karen Bartholomew Award, is professor emeritus of civil and environmental engineering and senior fellow of Woods Institute for the Environment. He was recognized for his talk on “Watering the Farm: Stanford’s Water Systems Old and New, Near and Far," his role shepherding the "Building the Transcontinental Railroad" program, his service on the society's Board of Directors from 2017 to 2024, his decade of service on the Program Committee, and his contributions as a university citizen.
The Karen Bartholomew Award was established in 2005 to recognize significant and distinguished volunteer service to the Stanford Historical Society (SHS) over a number of years. The award’s first recipient and its namesake was Karen Bartholomew ('71), who joined as a member of the society at its founding in 1976 and has been a volunteer for the society since, actively involved in the writing, editing, and production of many SHS publications.
The Stanford Asian Pacific American Alumni Club (SAPAAC) received the 2025 Susan W. Schofield Oral History Award for the Stanford Asian American Pacific Islander Oral History Project. Comprised of over two dozen interviews, the project captures personal narratives about Asian American identity and experiences at Stanford, the establishment of Asian American student organizations, advocacy for ethnic studies, and broader struggles for inclusion.
Jacob Wang, a member of the Class of 1972 who served as project coordinator, accepted the award on behalf of the organization. SAPACC members Nelson Nagai ('72), Katie Gee Salisbury ('07, MA '08), Bo-Gay Tong Salvador ('71), Risa Shimoda ('77), Jacob Wang ('72), Irene Yen ('85), and Crystal Zheng ('10, MA '11), along with A3C student interns Britney Tran ('23, MS '24) and Matthew Vilaysak ('25), conducted the interviews.
The award committee commended SAPAAC for its enthusiasm and dedication in conducting interviews that preserve and amplify the voices of Asian American alumni and staff at Stanford and noted the future archival and teaching value of the project. As the project nominators wrote, “The SAAPI Oral History Project is a powerful, crucial contribution to the understanding of Stanford’s institutional evaluation and in underscoring the existence and ongoing contributions of Asian American students, alumni, and staff…The oral histories serve as an inspiration for the broader Stanford campus to engage in continued inquiry, advocacy, research and scholarship with Asian American issues and history.”
The Stanford Historical Society Oral History Program is processing the interviews for inclusion in the Stanford University Archives and the entire collection will be available online.
The award committee also presented Oral History Certificates of Commendation to Dr. Jennifer Stonaker, an advanced lecturer in the Program in Writing and Rhetoric, and Diego Bustamante ('25) for the Arizona Garden Oral History Project. In designing and conducting interviews that document the history, restoration, and stewardship of Stanford’s historic Arizona Garden, the pair contributed a unique place-centered project that imaginatively investigates the lives of plants and the meaning of nature to the community.
Established in 2018, the Susan W. Schofield Oral History Award is given annually by the Stanford Historical Society Oral History Program for excellence in the practice of oral history. Its purpose is to encourage oral history at Stanford University, to strengthen the collections of the Stanford Historical Society and the Stanford Libraries, and to recognize excellent quality in oral history work.
The third annual award sponsored by the Stanford Historical Society, the Beyers Prize for Excellence in Historical Writing, has an extended deadline of June 15. The award will be presented next year.
For information about future award submission deadlines, please visit the Opportunities page on the Stanford Historical Society website.
