2026 Lewis Walpole Library Summer Fellowship for Yale Graduate Students

Yale Graduate Fellowship

This Fellowship affords Yale Graduate Students the opportunity to spend two, four, or eight weeks between June 1 and August 31 in residence at the library in Farmington, Connecticut, to delve into its rich collections of eighteenth-century materials (mainly British), including important holdings of prints, drawings, manuscripts, rare books, and paintings.

Fellowship awards include:

• a supplement to your graduate student stipend, depending upon the duration of your Fellowship:
• 8 weeks: $4000
• 4 weeks: $2000
• 2 weeks: $1000

A bedroom at the Timothy Root House, an eighteenth-century residence on the Library's campus, adjacent to the main Library building. There is a shared self-catering kitchen and lounge, and each bedroom has a desk and an attached full bathroom.

About the Lewis Walpole Library:
The Lewis Walpole Library (LWL), a department of the Yale University Library, is a research center for eighteenth-century studies and an essential resource for the study of Horace Walpole and Strawberry Hill. The library, a gift to Yale University from Walpole collector and editor Wilmarth Sheldon Lewis, and his wife, Annie Burr Lewis, is located on a fourteen-acre campus in historic Farmington, Connecticut.

Students applying for a fellowship should be at an advanced stage in their research and propose a fully conceptualized project related to their degree program and on a topic relevant to the Lewis Walpole Library's holdings. Students are required to be in residence in Farmington, Connecticut, and focus their research on the library collections.

Applicants are required to submit the following materials through Interfolio:

• A résumé
• A statement expressing preferred duration and dates of residency
• A brief research proposal (not to exceed three double-spaced pages), explaining the relevance of the Lewis Walpole Library's collections to the applicant's research objectives
• A list of relevant Lewis Walpole Library sources that the applicant expects to consult
• An approved dissertation prospectus or equivalent statement outlining the scope of the proposed project as it relates to the applicant's degree program
• The applicant must also request, via the online application portal, a confidential letter of recommendation from the applicant's dissertation advisor (for PhD students) or primary advisor (for other graduate students)

The University is committed to basing judgments concerning the admission, education, and employment of individuals upon their qualifications and abilities and seeks to attract to its faculty, staff, and student body qualified persons from a broad range of backgrounds and perspectives.

Additionally, in accordance with this Policy and as delineated by federal and Connecticut law, Yale does not discriminate in admissions, educational programs, or employment against any individual on account of that individual's sex; sexual orientation; gender identity or expression; pregnancy, childbirth or related conditions; race; color; national or ethnic origin; religion; age; disability; protected veteran status, or other protected classes as set forth in federal and Connecticut law.

Professional Conduct Review for New Faculty Hires

The final candidate, upon acceptance of a contingent offer of employment/faculty appointment, may be required to disclose whether they are, or have been, the subject of any disciplinary proceeding (investigation, hearing, etc.) at previous institutions or employers, and may also be subject to a background screening. Candidates who materially misrepresent information on their resume or other application materials are ineligible for hire/appointment.

Final candidates may also be required to sign a release to allow Yale to solicit information regarding any substantiated conduct violations from current and/or past employers.