Marie Jenkins Schwartz, Ph.D., is professor emeritus of history at the University of Rhode Island and an independent scholar and writer. Her research and writing interests focus on the history of slavery, women, and children. She is the author of three books: Ties That Bound: Founding First Ladies and Slaves (2017, Chicago University Press); Birthing a Slave: Motherhood and Medicine in the Antebellum South (2006, Harvard University Press); and Born in Bondage: Growing Up Enslaved in the Antebellum South (2000, Harvard University Press). She is working on a fourth tentatively called Scandal: First Ladies, Unfaithful Presidents, and the Rise of Modern-Day Politics. Schwartz is the recipient of two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and other awards, including the Julia Cherry Spruill Publication Prize for Best Book in Southern Women’s History given by the Southern Association for Women Historians. Schwartz holds a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland, College Park. At the University of Rhode Island, she served terms as executive director of its Center for the Humanities and as chair of the history department.