On May 24, 2006, Stacy Schiff, the winner of the 2006 George Washington Book Prize, gave a lecture for more than 100 students from School Without Walls, a high school based on the campus of George Washington University in Washington, D.C. School Without Walls is the only Gilder Lehrman history school in the District of Columbia. The lecture, sponsored by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, was followed by a Q and A session with the students.

The second annual George Washington Book Prize was awarded to Schiff at Historic Mount Vernon on May 23 for her book, A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America. The $50,000 prize honors the most important new book about the founding era. Schiff, winner of the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for biography, tells the story of the eight years Benjamin Franklin spent in France beginning in 1776.

The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland, and the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association collaborated in 2005 to create the prize, awarded in its inaugural year to Ron Chernow for Alexander Hamilton.

The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History sponsors 31 history schools and 14 Saturday academies nationwide. Gilder Lehrman history schools are rigorous, college-preparatory schools centered on American history. They have a track record of raising test scores and sending more than 90 percent of graduating seniors to college. At the core of these schools is a four-year sequence of courses in American history. In many of these schools, the entire student body participates in the Gilder Lehrman program. In other schools, a select portion of the student body participates.