Ruth & Ray Reister Award for Historical Contributions to the Humanities
About the Ruth & Ray Reister Award
The Ruth & Ray Reister Award for Historical Contributions to the Humanities (Ruth & Ray Reister Award) celebrates individuals whose work deepens our understanding of Minnesota and demonstrates the vital role history plays in helping us understand our communities, our shared experiences, and the world around us.
The Award honors Reister’s legacy by celebrating those whose work keeps Minnesota history visible, relevant, and accessible to communities across the state.
Administered by the Minnesota Humanities Center (MHC), the Ruth & Ray Reister Award recognizes the many ways people research, preserve, interpret, teach, document, and share Minnesota history.
By elevating exceptional contributions to the understanding and appreciation of Minnesota, MHC seeks to strengthen public engagement with the state’s history, broaden the stories and contributions that are recognized, and affirm the past as an essential part of Minnesota’s humanities landscape.
Inaugural Awardee
The inaugural Reister Award for Historical Contributions to the Humanities was presented to Dr. Christopher Lehman. Dr. Lehman’s award-winning scholarship, including Slavery’s Reach: Southern Slaveholders in the North Star State, examines how histories of race and power shaped Minnesota’s development. His work invites Minnesotans to engage more fully with our shared past – centering voices and experiences long excluded from dominant narratives and enriching public understanding of history
Questions?
For questions about the Ruth & Ray Reister Award, eligibility, or the nomination process, contact:
programs@mnhum.orgRuth A. Reister (1936–2015) was a pioneering leader whose career spanned law, finance, and public service at a time when women faced significant professional barriers. From being the only woman in her law school graduating class to serving in senior roles at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis and as Deputy Undersecretary at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Ruth forged a path defined by excellence, determination, and service. Her lifelong commitment to education, history, and civic life reflected a deep belief in the role of the humanities in public life.
Together with her husband, Raymond A. Reister (1929–2005), a distinguished attorney, civic leader, and former Minnesota Humanities Commission Board member, the Reister’s shared a profound commitment to the humanities, intellectual life, and community engagement. Their shared interests in history, literature, and public discourse shaped a legacy grounded in curiosity, learning, and service to others.
In 2016, Ruth’s legacy was transformed into lasting public impact through a bequest to the Minnesota Humanities Center that established the Ruth & Ray Reister Award for Historical Contributions to the Humanities, supported by the Reister Endowment. This annual award recognizes historians whose work deepens understanding of our state’s past and brings history into public conversation – ensuring sustained support for public historical scholarship in Minnesota.
Nomination for the Ruth & Ray Reister Award Now Open
Nominations for the 2026 Ruth & Ray Reister Award are now being accepted. The 2026 Awardee will receive a $5,000 unrestricted award, commemorative recognition, and be celebrated at the Minnesota Humanities Center’s Annual Event on October 20, 2026.
The Ruth & Ray Reister Award is intended not only to recognize outstanding contributions, but also to help bring that work to broader audiences. During the year following the Award, MHC will work with the Awardee to identify opportunities to share and extend their work.
These opportunities may include:
- Highlighting the Awardee and their work through MHC’s website, newsletter, social media, and other communications;
- Collaborating on one or two MHC programs or public events related to the Awardee’s work;
- Exploring other opportunities to increase awareness, understanding, and engagement with Minnesota history and the humanities based on the awardee’s work, interests, and availability.
Who can be Nominated?
The Ruth & Ray Reister Award recognizes that important historical work happens in many places and takes many forms.
Eligible nominees may include academic and public historians, educators, community historians, Tribal and Indigenous historians and knowledge holders, archivists, preservationists, museum professionals, writers, storytellers, cultural practitioners, independent scholars, and others engaged in meaningful historical work.
What Is Required
Nominees Must:
- Have a significant connection to Minnesota. Nominees must live or work in Minnesota or demonstrate a substantial body of work focused on Minnesota, its people, communities, histories, or experiences.
- Contribute meaningfully to Minnesota history and the humanities. Contributions may include scholarship, education, cultural work, public programming, storytelling, preservation, interpretation, civic engagement, or related work.
- Demonstrate meaningful impact. The nominee’s work should contribute to public understanding and/or have a meaningful impact on Minnesota communities, institutions, audiences, or the field.
- Demonstrate sustained, distinctive, and/or recent contribution. Nominees should demonstrate a meaningful body of historical work or a particularly significant contribution worthy of statewide recognition. Nominations should also identify significant work or accomplishments from the past 18 months, which may include publications, peer-reviewed scholarship, public or community history projects, exhibits, educational or interpretive work, awards, honors, fellowships, or other notable contributions or recognition.
Additional Eligibility Information
- Individuals may be nominated by another person or organization, and self-nominations are welcome.
- Nominees do not need to be affiliated with a college, university, museum, historical society, or other institution.
- Both professional historians and individuals conducting significant historical work outside of their primary employment may be considered.
- A nominee’s work may be local, regional, statewide, or focused on a particular Minnesota community. Statewide reach is not required.
- Current members of the Ruth A. Reister Award Review Committee are not eligible during the award cycle in which they serve.
- MHC staff and/or Board Members are not eligible.
- Previous Reister Award recipients are not eligible for consecutive award cycles.
What Is Not Required
Nominees are not required to:
- Hold an advanced degree in history or another humanities discipline;
- Hold an academic appointment;
- Work professionally under the title of “historian”;
- Be affiliated with an institution;
- Have published a book or scholarly article; or
- Demonstrate statewide reach.
The Review Committee will evaluate all eligible nominations using the published Reister Award selection criteria and scoring rubric.
Nominations will be considered using the following criteria. Together, these criteria recognize the many ways individuals can contribute to Minnesota history and the humanities- from scholarship and education to storytelling, preservation, interpretation, and community engagement.
Criterion
What We Are Looking For
Points Possible
1. Significant Contribution to the Humanities
Meaningful contributions through scholarship, education, cultural work, public programming, storytelling, preservation, interpretation, civic engagement, or related work.
10
2. Impact on Minnesota Communities
Demonstrated impact on Minnesota’s people, communities, institutions, or public understanding.
10
3. Advancing Understanding Across Experiences and Perspectives
Work that helps Minnesotans better understand themselves, one another, their communities, and the histories and ideas that shape our shared life.
10
4. Sustained or Distinctive Contribution
A sustained body of meaningful work or a particularly significant contribution worthy of statewide recognition. This may include scholarship, publications, public or community history, exhibits, educational and interpretive work, awards, honors, or other notable contributions.
10
5. Alignment with the Spirit of the Ruth & Ray Reister Award
Work that reflects the spirit of the Ruth & Ray Reister Award by advancing the understanding and appreciation of Minnesota history and strengthening its place within the humanities.
10
Maximum score: 50 points
The scoring framework helps provide consistency across nominations while allowing the Review Committee to consider the significance and character of each nominee’s contributions as a whole.
Submit a Nomination
Nominations for the Ruth & Ray Reister Award may be submitted by an individual, organization, colleague, community member, or the nominee themselves. Self-nominations are welcome.
The nomination is designed to help the Review Committee understand the nominee’s work, its significance, and its contribution to Minnesota history and the humanities. Before beginning the nomination form, please gather the following information and materials.
The 2026 Ruth & Ray Reister Awardee will be announced publicly at MHC’s Annual Event on October 20, 2026. The Awardee will not be announced in advance.
All nominees will be invited and encouraged to attend the Annual Event as MHC celebrates their contributions to Minnesota history and the humanities and announces the 2026 Awardee.
Key Dates
September 1, 2026 – Nominations open
September 30, 2026 – Nominations close
Early–Mid October 2026 – Review Committee evaluates nominations and recommends Award recipient(s)
October 20, 2026 – Ruth & Ray Reister Award presented at MHC’s Annual Event
Following the Annual Event – Award recipient(s) and their contributions are celebrated through MHC communications
Nominee Information
Basic information about the person being nominated, including their name, city, county, and ZIP code, title or role, organizational affiliation (if applicable), email address, phone number, and website (if applicable).
Nominator Information
Your name, relationship to the nominee, organizational affiliation (if applicable), email address, and phone number. If you are nominating yourself, simply indicate that you are submitting a self-nomination.
Brief Nominee Biography — 150–250 words
Provide a short biography that introduces the nominee and summarizes their background, work, and connection to Minnesota history and the humanities.
Nomination Statement — maximum 1,000 words
Tell us why this individual should be considered for the Ruth A. Reister Award. Describe the nominee’s contributions, the significance and impact of their work, and how their work has contributed to greater understanding of Minnesota’s people, communities, histories, experiences, or ideas. Specific examples are encouraged.
Examples or Evidence of the Nominee’s Work — up to three
Provide up to three representative examples that help demonstrate the nominee’s contributions and impact. All examples must be uploaded as PDF files. Please select representative samples or excerpts that best illustrate the nominee’s work rather than submitting lengthy works in their entirety.
Examples may include excerpts from publications or scholarly work; representative samples from educational or interpretive materials; or documentation of public or community history projects, exhibits, digital projects, storytelling, preservation work, or other relevant contributions.
For nominees with an extensive body of work, a bibliography, publication list, project list, or similar overview may be included as one of the three uploaded documents to provide context for the nominee’s broader body of work (if not otherwise included in their CV).
For publications or scholarly work, you will also have an opportunity to indicate whether the submitted work has been peer-reviewed.
Recent Contributions & Recognition — Past 18 Months. Optional, if applicable.
Identify significant work, accomplishments, or recognition from the past 18 months that may provide additional context for the nomination. Examples may include publications or scholarly work, public or community history projects, exhibits, educational or interpretive work, awards, honors, fellowships, or other notable contributions.
Resume or CV — required
Upload a current resume or curriculum vitae that provides additional information about the nominee’s professional, scholarly, community, or other relevant experience and accomplishments.
Letter of support – required
Submit one letter of support that provides additional perspective on the nominee’s work, contributions, or impact.
Before submitting the nomination, you will be asked to confirm that the information provided is accurate and that the nominee meets the published eligibility requirements. You will also be asked to give MHC permission to contact the nominee as part of the Award process.
The form may also include demographic and geographic questions. This information helps MHC understand the statewide reach of the nomination process and is not required to submit a nomination.
The Ruth & Ray Reister Award recognizes work grounded in responsible and ethical historical practice. Nominators will be asked to affirm that, to the best of their knowledge, the work represented in the nomination demonstrates integrity in the research, interpretation, documentation, and presentation of history.
Nominations are reviewed by a 15-member Review Committee convened by the Minnesota Humanities Center.
The Committee brings together perspectives from across Minnesota’s humanities and history communities, including academic, public, and community humanities; historical and cultural organizations; higher education and K–12 education; Tribal and Indigenous humanities; and civic and community leadership. Collectively, members reflect a range of geographic, professional, cultural, generational, and lived experiences.
Eligible nominations are reviewed using the published Award criteria and a common scoring rubric. Committee members first review and score nominations independently and then come together to deliberate and recommend an Awardee.
Scores provide a consistent framework for considering nominations but do not alone determine the Awardee. The Committee considers the strength, significance, and impact of each nominee’s contributions as a whole when developing its recommendation.
Review Committee members are required to disclose potential conflicts of interest and recuse themselves from reviewing nominations when appropriate. The Committee’s recommendation is submitted to the Minnesota Humanities Center’s CEO for final confirmation.
Submit Your Nominee for the Ruth & Ray Reister Award Today!
Nominate a friend, family member, teacher, colleague, or yourself for the Ruth & Ray Reister Award. Download the PDF version of the complete nomination form to review all questions and required materials and prepare your responses before beginning the online submission.
Nominations close September 30, 2026, at 11:59 p.m.
Submit Your Online NominationNomination Information Sessions
Considering nominating someone for the Ruth & Ray Reister Award? Join Minnesota Humanities Center staff for a short Zoom information session to learn more about the award, nomination requirements, submission process, and what to prepare before you begin. There will also be time for questions.
Both sessions will cover the same information. Advance registration is required. Choose the session that works best for you:
Information Session 1: Wednesday, September 9, 4:00 p.m. CDT
Register NowInformation session 2: Wednesday, September 16, 5:00 p.m. CDT
Register Now
