Jeffrey T. Manuel

Jeff Manuel is a writer, college professor, and public historian whose research and teaching focus on energy, technology, and the environment. He is the co-author (with Tom Rogers) of Ethanol: A Hemispheric History for the Future of Biofuels, a linked history of ethanol fuel in the United States and Brazil. It was published by the University of Oklahoma Press in 2025.

Manuel is also the author of Taconite Dreams: The Struggle to Sustain Mining on Minnesota’s Iron Range, 1915-2000, which received multiple awards for nonfiction. His research has also been published in numerous academic journals. His nonacademic writing has appeared in the Washington Post, The Hill, Public Seminar, and elsewhere.

As a teacher and practitioner, Manuel is active in public and oral history. He has curated and been an online producer for exhibitions in Minnesota and Illinois. Along with Jason Stacy, he created and co-edits Madison Historical: The Online Encyclopedia and Digital Archive for Madison County, Illinois. He has also directed or contributed to community oral history projects in the St. Louis region.

Manuel is a professor of history at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. He teaches classes in the history of technology, environmental history, public, oral, and local history. He also serves as the Director of Graduate Studies for the Department of History and supervises student internships.

Manuel lives in Edwardsville, Illinois.