Jay H. Buckley received a PhD in History from the University of Nebraska after receiving his BA and MA in History from BYU. Currently an Associate Professor of History, Buckley is the Director of the Charles Redd Center for Western Studies and Director of BYU’s interdisciplinary American Indian Studies Minor.
Buckley is author of the award-winning William Clark: Indian Diplomat (2008). He also wrote A Golden Jubilee History: The Charles Redd Center for Western Studies at BYU, 1972-2022 (2022). Other peer-reviewed, co-authored books include: By His Own Hand?: The Mysterious Death of Meriwether Lewis (2006); Zebulon Pike, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West (2012); Great Plains Forts (2023).
Co-authored and edited books in public history, local history, pedagogical history, and historical reference include: Orem [Utah] (2010); Historical Dictionary of the American Frontier (2015); Explorers of the American West: Mapping the World through Primary Documents (2016); Explorers of the American East: Mapping the World through Primary Documents (2018); The Life and Adventures of Mr. Eli Wiggill: South African 1820 Settler, Wesleyan Missionary, and Latter-day Saint (2024).
Buckley served as President of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation (2011-12), which provides national leadership on scholarship, education, and conservation pertaining to the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail. His teaching and research specialties include the fur trade, Lewis & Clark, exploration & migration, Indigenous-white relations, the South African frontier, and other western themes.
Current book project: Woolly Wonders: A History of Sheep Herding and Ranching in Utah and the Intermountain West