Education
Fenn received a bachelor of arts degree in history (with honors) from Duke University in 1981, then attended Yale University, finishing her masters in 1985.
Fenn received a bachelor of arts degree in history (with honors) from Duke University in 1981, then attended Yale University, finishing her masters in 1985.
She serves as the Walter South. and Lucienne Driskill chair in Western American History at University of Colorado-Boulder. Fenn originally planned to write her dissertation on millenarianism in Native American culture, but left her doctoral program at Yale before it was finished, as she was "bored" with academia. Fenn entered the auto mechanic program at Durham Technical Community College and worked as a mechanic around the Durham, North Carolina area for eight years before returning to Yale in 1995 to complete her studies.
Pox Americana, her dissertation about the 1775-1782 North American smallpox epidemic, was written while working part-time, and completed in 1999.
Fenn was interviewed on multiple national news outlets about biological warfare after the September 11 attacks. Prior to joining the University of Colorado at Boulder in 2012, Fenn taught at George Washington University from 1999 to 2002 and Duke from 2002 to 2012.