Rate My Professor John Grigg

John Grigg is a Professor in the Department of History at the University of Nebraska Omaha. He earned his Ph.D. in History from the University of Kansas in 2002, with his dissertation completed under Dr. Peter C. Mancall titled “The lives of David Brainerd.” Earlier, he graduated from the University of Queensland in Australia with a degree in chemistry. Prior to pursuing an academic career, Grigg held positions as an accounts clerk, taxi driver, youth leader, urban missionary, and hotel clerk. He joined the University of Nebraska Omaha in 2006 as an assistant professor of History, advancing to full professor and serving as Chairperson of the department. Born in New Zealand and raised in Australia, Grigg serves as the academic advisor for junior and senior-level History majors and has reached 15 years of service at the university as of 2021.

Grigg's research interests include Early America, Atlantic History, and Global Encounters 1500-1800. His specializations focus on religious upheavals in New England and New Jersey in the 1730s and 1740s, the geographical and temporal scope of colonial America, social conditions in New Jersey circa 1700-1765, and the role of conspiracy theories in American history. He is the author of The Lives of David Brainerd: The Making of an American Evangelical Icon (Oxford University Press, 2009). Grigg has published several articles and presented papers on religious upheavals in early America, including a lengthy essay titled “Missions” in the Oxford Handbook of Jonathan Edwards. He continues work on a study of local communities in eighteenth-century New Jersey. His frequently taught courses include Colonial America (HIST 4140/8146), Religion in Early America (HIST 4010/8016), American History to 1865 (HIST 1110), and graduate seminars in Early America and Global Encounters.