2023

• Jordan Schaefer (1st place), University of Tennessee, Knoxville, A Phenomenological Study of 12th Unnamed Cave, a Dark-Zone Cave Art Site, through 3D Photogrammetric Modeling and Archaeoacoustics
• Lia Kitteringham (runner up), Colorado State University, Birds, Enclosures, and Indigenous Landscapes: Creating the Eastern Precinct of Pinson Mounds

2022

• Patrick Druggan (1st place), Pennsylvania State University, New Estimates of the Timing and Tempo of Population Change at Cahokia
• Mikayla Absher (runner up), Tulane University, Experiencing Poverty Point: Intersections of Land, Water, and Sky

2021

• C. Trevor Duke (1st place), University of Florida, Tempered Subjects: Ritual Potting as Efficacious Action in Pre-Columbian Tampa Bay
• Seth Grooms (runner up), Washington University, St. Louis, Building Chronologies and Discovering History at the Jaketown Site, a Poverty Point-affiliated Mound Site in West-central Mississippi

2019

• Robert Barlow (1st place), University of Wyoming, Paleoindian and Early Archaic Response to the Younger Dryas in North Alabama: An Analysis of Variability in Resharpening of Hafted Bifaces
• Seth Grooms (runner up), Washington University, St. Louis, Mound Building at the Jaketown Site: Sacred Ballast on a Volatile Landscape

2018

• Brandon T. Ritchison (1st place), University of Georgia, The Downstream Effects of Abandonment: Settlement and Organization at the Kenan Field Site
• Jeffrey Alvey (runner up), University of Missouri, Columbia, Exploring the Relationship between Maize Agriculture and Population Growth in the Central and Lower Mississippi River Valley

2017

• Diana Simpson (1st place), The University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Synthesizing Care and Violence during the Archaic Period in North Alabama
• Shawn Lambert (runner up), University of Oklahoma, A Provenance and Stylistic Study of Formative Caddo Vessels: Implications for Specialized Ritual Craft Production and Long-Distance Exchange

2016

• Mallory A. Melton (1st place), University of California – Santa Barbara, A Precautionary Tale: European Encounters, Uncertainty, and Food Security in the Seventeenth-Century North Carolina Piedmont
• Rachel V. Briggs (runner up), University of Alabama, Communities of Practice of the Hominy Foodway during Early Moundville

2015

• Jacob Lulewicz (1st place), University of Georgia, A Bayesian Radiocarbon Chronology for Northwestern Georgia, A.D. 700-1400

• Brandon T. Ritchison (runner up), University of Georgia, Evaluating Population Movement using State Site File Data: Understanding the Irene Phase Transition on the Georgia Coast

2014

• Meghan E. Buchanan (1st place), Indiana University, Bloomington, Making Pots, Making War: Mississippian Plate Iconography in the Midcontinent

• John R. Samuelsen (runner up), University of Arkansas, A Reanalysis of Strontium Isotopes from the Crenshaw Site: Implications on Caddo Interregional Warfare

2013

• Megan Kassabaum (1st place), University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, First, We Eat: Conceptualizing Feasting at Feltus

• Zackary I. Gilmore (runner up), University of Florida, Pottery's Place in the Gathering Histories of Florida's Late Archaic Monuments

2012

• Dana Bardolph (1st place), University of California, Santa Barbara, Culinary Encounters and Cahokian Contact: Food Preparation, Serving, and Storage in the Central Illinois River Valley

• Alice Wright (runner up), University of Michigan, From Mountains to Mounds: Assessing the Routes of Middle Woodland Mica Transport

2011

• Erik S. Porth (1st place), University of Alabama, Raised Ground, Razed Structure: Ceramic Chronology, Occupation, and Chiefly Authority on Mound P at Moundville

• Erin Phillips (runner up), University of Alabama, Moundville Shell Gorgets

2010

• Logan Kistler (1st place), Penn State University, Ancient DNA Confirms a Local Origin of Domesticated Chenopod in Eastern North America

• Lauren McMillan (runner up), University of Tennessee, Put This in Your Pipe and Smoke it: An Evaluation of Pipe Stem Dating Methods

2009

• Lee Arco (1st place), Washington University, St. Louis, Geoarchaeology of the Buried Poverty Point Landscape at Jaketown

• John Samuelsen (runner up), University of Arkansas, Archaeogeophysical Investigations of Early Caddo Settlement Patterning at the Crenshaw Site (3MI6)

2008

• Jeremy Davis (1st place), University of Alabama, Crafting in the Countryside: A Comparison of Three Late Prehistoric Nonmound Sites in the Black Warrior River Valley

• Chris Moore (runner up), University of Kentucky, A Macroscopic Investigation of Technological Style and the Production of Middle to Late Archaic Fishhooks at the Chiggerville, Read, and Baker Sites, Western Kentucky

2007

• Glenn Strickland (1st place), University of Mississippi, The Archaeological Unifying Constant: Interpretations of a Late Mississippian Mound Group through Digital Spatial Modeling

• Clete Rooney (runner up),University of Florida, Beyond Kingsley: Reconcepualizing the Archaeology and Anthropology of Fort George Island, Florida

2006

• Mary Beth Fitts (1st place), University of North Carolina, St. Louis, People of the River, People of the Trail: Mapping Catawba Coalesence

• Adam Schieffer (runner up), University of South Florida, What's Cookin'? European Influence on Cherokee Subsistence at Coweeta Creek during the Qualla Phase (A.D. 1300-1908)

2005

• Lance Greene, University of North Carolina, Race, Class, and Material Culture in Antebellum North Carolina

2004

• Victor Thompson, University of Kentucky, The Formation and Function of Shell Rings: A Case Study from Sapelo Island

2003

• John Marcoux, University of North Carolina, The Materialization of Status and Social Structure at the Kogers Island Cemetery, Alabama

2002

• Jennifer Myer, University of Alabama, Among the fields: Mississippian settlement patterns in the Black Warrior Valley

2001

• Ashley Dumas, University of Alabama, Plotting the Past: A Study in Archaeological Method at the Original Tabasco Factory, Avery Island, Louisiana

2000

• Greg Wilson, University of North Carolina, Small Celt, Big Celt, Old Celt, New Celt: The Moundville Greenstone Industry in the Black Warrior Valley, Alabama

1999

• Barnet Pavao-Zuckerman, University of Georgia, Vertebrate Subsistence in the Mississippian-Historic Period Transition

1998

• Keith Little, University of Alabama, The Emergence of Etowah: A Prehistoric Polity which Occupied Portions of the Valley and Ridge and Piedmont in Northwest Georgia and Northeast Alabama

1997

• Amber VanDerwarker, University of North Carolina, Feasting and the Formulation of Food Use at the Toqua Site

1996

• Jason McBrayer, Tulane University, Elite Polygyny in Southeastern Chiefdoms

1995

• Sissel Schroeder, Pennsylvania State University, Ancient Landscapes and Sociopolitical Change in the Southern American Bottom, Illinois

1994

• Mary Beth Trubitt, Northwestern University, The Formation of House Floor and Fill Assemblages in the Mississippian American Bottom, Illinois

1993

• Patrick Jones, Tulane University, Lake of the Taensa: A Report on a Recent Survey of Lake St Joseph, Louisiana

1992

• Amy Lambeck Young, University of Tennessee, An Analysis of Nails from the Gibbs House Site