- I'd like to welcome everybody back
for our second panel.
I realize that this morning
I forgot to mention
the sponsors for this event.
We have received support from
Dartmouth's 250th Committee.
From the Dickey Center for
International Understanding.
From the Departments of
Classics and of History.
And for the work that you will see
summarized and presented here,
we had funding for curricular innovation
from Leslie Humanity Center Grant.
And for the special work
of my learning fellow
Nataly DeFreitas, we had extended support
from the UGAR,
the Undergraduate Office
for Undergraduate Research.
This second panel concerns
wars with living memory.
Students in War Stories,
which was COLT 64/CLST 11,
interviewed alumni veterans with the focus
on the effects of the wars.
World War II Veterans,
we had two respondents,
both of which had to express regrets
that they couldn't participate,
mainly from Korea and Vietnam.
The post-Vietnam interviews will not
be presented here, that's
a work in progress.
We asked them, the students were tasked
to ask them about their
student experience,
the atmosphere and the
discourses on the campus
during the war, their relationships
with their professors,
with their fellow students,
and with the liberal arts curriculum,
both before and after their service.
Their understandings of military service,
as duty, as service, as,
I guess, potential career.
And that work is going to be framed,
summarized and presented today for you
as panel number two.
The goal of the interview
assignment was two-fold.
To collect historical evidence
for what I hope is an
upcoming manuscript project
on Dartmouth's long
history with the military.
There was a second
desired learning outcome
and that was to create respectful,
intergenerational dialogue
between veterans and students,
many of whom had no direct experience
in their families of military
service and sacrifice.
After the Vietnam war era
and Professor and President Wright
has said much about this,
families no longer have direct experience.
So the students were given the opportunity
to learn from military veterans.
The evidence is the interviews
of alumni veterans and
I want to thank them.
Jerry Mitchell, the class of '51.
Bradley Corregan, the class of '52.
Daniel Boyd, the class of '53.
John Mauldwin, Dartmouth class of '55.
David Prewitt of '61.
Tim Brooks, Anthony Tony Thompson,
Rand Beers, Dartmouth class of '64.
James Weiskopf, class of '66.
Burton Quist, Ron Brown, David Walden,
Dartmouth class of '68.
John Frondorf, class of '69.
James Boylan, class of '78.
Robert Charles, class of '82.
Richard Utson, class of '85.
Terry Stentz grad school class of '89.
Joseph Scott, 2000 and
Christian Heiss, 2002.
Each of those veterans gave their time,
some of them skeptically,
but in the end, I received
glowing thank you notes
for the interactions they
had with our students.
And so, the work that's
going to be presented.
The presenters, I had marvelous students.
Miss Paula Lenart, Dartmouth class of '20
is an international student,
she is an engineering major,
modified with studio art,
the left brain right brain
of The Dartmouth student is remarkable.
And she is the center for Dartmouth's
women's basketball team.
She is forceful on the
court and successful,
on and off, and her work in War Stories
was exemplary and I'm delighted
she can join us today to present.
Vitalia Williams, Dartmouth class of 2022,
is part of the Third Posse Cohort
at Dartmouth campus.
She served in the U.S. Army, 2013 to 2018,
at the rank of Staff Sergeant.
She worked in watercraft
logistics operations,
you're allowed to ask her what that means.
She interviewed a local Dartmouth alum,
Jerry Mitchell, and I'm delighted
that she will bring his
words forward today.
Nataly DeFreitas is a senior,
an econ and English major,
a veteran, and a military spouse.
She served in the U.S. Army Reserve
and deployed in Afghanistan in 2012
as a PSYOP specialist.
She worked as my learning
fellow in War Stories in 2018.
She worked as a junior research fellow,
there's UGAR, in spring 2018
and to prepare for this program,
I've received further funding
and she's going to
continue to work with me,
I say, looking over at her.
And so, I hand the program over to her
and to them, if you will
help me welcome them.
(applauding)
- Thank you Professor Stewart
and thank you everyone for taking the time
to come and listen to us speak today.
My research focused on
Dartmouth student veterans,
Dartmouth alumni that served,
the conversations and dialogues
that went on around war,
which played out, in large
part, in The Dartmouth
and were available for
me to peruse through.
I want to thank Professor Stewart
for the opportunity to do this research
and also to take part in
the War Stories course
in the fall of 2018.
It was a learning experience for me,
even as I was facilitating conversations.
I learned a lot from the other students
and there's just a lot to
learn from the dialogues.
And so, through the research, I discovered
what maybe wasn't apparent to me
when I first came to Dartmouth campus,
is that Dartmouth has
a very deep history with the military
and a very strong connection
with the military.
In War Stories, we talked about discourses
that transcend time and I found that
over and over and over again,
reading through The Dartmouth,
looking through archives in Rauner.
And I would like to mention how amazing
and helpful the librarians
are at the Rauner Library
and the amazing resources they have,
it was wonderful to work with them.
And I also gained a better perspective on,
what I think I can characterize
through my research in The Dartmouth,
is World War II is a good war.
And so, I started looking
at where Dartmouth was at in 1939,
and this is, I think, a
neat map, drawn by an alum
of what Dartmouth's campus looked like
and we can see that there
is certain buildings missing
but some of the main characteristics
of Dartmouth are definitely there
and there's a little skier
in the upper right-hand
corner which I enjoy.
So, we're looking at a
campus that is different
from what would experience today.
So, in published in 1939,
Dartmouth used to have something called
"The Green Book" which was like a yearbook
of sorts for freshman
incoming into Dartmouth.
In 1939 they published,
for the class of '43,
this is in the forward
of "The Green Book",
featuring a picture of Memorial Field,
the memorial to World War I,
and in it, it has a forward
and the forward says in part,
that we're looking to World War II.
The students at Dartmouth were trying
to put in context what
they were beginning to face
with a world war and they were thinking
of the thousands of Dartmouth men
who fought for America in the last war
and the hope that their college education
would not be wasted in battle
and their contribution to society
could be greater than that.
So, in the context of the coming war
and questions about involvement,
other students were questioning it
a little bit less.
This is from Rauner's "Oral
History of World War II",
from Walker Reed, class of '40,
who served in the U.S. Army,
who describes what we know today
as The Dartmouth bubble.
He said, "We were in a
shell, I was at least.
"I don't know why we
weren't more conscious
"of international
affairs, probably because
"it wasn't just of great interest."
But although many
students were in a bubble,
we still have that framework
of the question of war
and questions of isolationism.
So, these are all from The Dartmouth,
all of the articles going forward
in my presentations
are from The Dartmouth,
and all of the quotes will
be from Dartmouth alums.
These all discuss the different pushes
towards joining the war, there's articles
to the President of the
United States printed,
there's opinion polls going
on with The Dartmouth,
and all in all, even though it might be
a slight majority,
Dartmouth gains a reputation
of being top in the nation
in willingness to actually go to war.
In the midst of these conversations
about whether or not
the United States should
enter World War II,
Dartmouth is doing a lot administratively
to prepare the college for war.
And so, operating since
before we joined World War II
is the American Defense Dartmouth Group,
which coordinated many war
related functions on campus,
including defense instruction.
So in the fall of 1941,
the American Defense Dartmouth Group,
which is a group formed
by President Hopkins
at Dartmouth College, which was comprised
of faculty members,
they printed that quote,
"We believe the United States should take
"vigorous action for the
destruction of Nazi tyranny,
"there can be no halfway
measures, no compromises.
"If this means war then let us enter it."
So there was a strong push
from The Dartmouth College Administration
and faculty of going and
entering into World War II.
The American Defense Dartmouth Group
had many purposes, these are some articles
talking about the group itself
and some of the consequences of the group,
which would be defense course enrollment.
So the ADDG Committee had committees
on press and publicity,
where they sent information
to different news outlets.
A committee on plans for permanent peace,
so not only were they thinking
about how can we prepare
for this eventuality of war,
but how will we find peace afterwards.
So, it was a lot of advanced
planning with the group.
They had a committee on radio.
A committee on public speaking
where they would send speakers
to different military bases to talk to
soldiers in the United States Army
about the importance of education.
And they had a committee
on defense instruction,
which is this article here,
which dealt with war related courses
that would be taught at the college.
The chairman of this committee,
Professor Messer at the time, said,
"That everything in college curriculum
"has been changed because of the war."
By 1941, anticipation of
the war and the actions
of the American Defense Dartmouth Group
brought defense courses to Dartmouth,
which also lowered enrollment
in other departments.
There were eight new fields of study,
seven new defense courses,
and by fall of 1941,
Dartmouth's first military course
since World War II offered a ski program.
The courses were in mathematics,
for navigation and ballistics,
electronic physics, map interpretation,
test and measurement
for military personnel,
modern war strategy in foreign policy,
power politics and components
of democratic thought,
and the departments of
classic civilization
and music department, enrollments
dropped by about half.
(laughing)
In favor of these courses.
In 1942, physical fitness tests
were required at Dartmouth.
It became a part of the student life here.
In fact, it was taken very seriously,
so seriously that students
who didn't take it,
faced suspension and the other ivy league
colleges followed suit.
Princeton, Harvard, and
Yale all incorporated
some form of mandatory fitness tests
in preparation for the eventually
of serving in the military.
And so the question of war permeates
a lot of the campus.
We have student polls in The Dartmouth
and even fraternities were holding
debates on the topic.
In 1941, President Hopkins
convocation address
talks about his specifically,
in which he advocates
joining the war effort.
He says, quote, "To ignore the fact
"that to be without force is to invite war
"is to ignore all of
the lessons of history
"and more fatal than lacking force
"is the lack of will to use it."
And so we know that by December,
Pearl Harbor happens and these are
the immediately reactions
in The Dartmouth.
One from December seventh,
one from December eighth.
And they just were very interesting to me.
Not every war has an immediately reaction
in The Dartmouth, because of timing
it was able to respond.
And what was incredible to me,
and this really moved me,
was December eighth there's already
a reaction from a student being published
in The Dartmouth and this gets to me
every time I read it.
I've got a couple of excerpts from it
and I think they characterize
the spirit of what the student
was trying to communicate.
This student wrote,
"We're at war with Japan.
"We personally would like to stop there
"and leave it at that.
"We would like to stop there
"because we are 20 years old,
"because this is the first war
"we have any memory of
which affects us personally
"and because when
something very big happens
"and is all around you and inside of you,
"there's not very much you can say
"because if we did say
what was inside of us,
"many people would laugh,
good people, maybe."
The writer goes on to say,
"So what can you say, one fellow,
"one American guy up
here in New Hampshire,
"3000 miles from San Francisco
"and another 2400 miles from Pearl Harbor,
"and still another 4750 miles from Manila?
"One fellow, 20 years
old, trying hard to speak
"for 2400 other fellows,
trying to fit yourself
"and them and every American,
"all 130 million of them
"into this too-big scheme of a world war."
And it kind of chokes me
up every time I read this
because it speaks to something to me
that transcends conflicts, time,
situations, context.
There are certain things about war
that are just difficult to put into words,
maybe impossible, and the
idea of facing the unknown
in a context that this
writer's trying to describe
of the personal, the national,
the world, the global,
and Dartmouth's campus
and how do you find
how to speak about this
and think about it, and
the difficulty of that is,
it was just moving to me.
But there were a lot
of different reactions.
And so, this is from
Samuel Florman of '46,
who ended up serving in the Navy V-12,
which I will talk about in a little bit.
This is also from Rauner's
Oral History Collection
of World War II, Florman said,
"It was very strange, the
early months of the war.
"We were in a war but
we had no television.
"There is plenty of censorship.
"The news was very slow
and there wasn't that much
"because things were
happening far far away
"and life after the original shock
"seemed eerily normal.
"So the thought was,
well going to college,
"we'll live our lives
"and maybe this war will
be over before we know it."
And this is something that I see
again and again and again
through the decades,
through the conflicts is the idea that
maybe, just maybe, the
conflict will pass me by,
but that underlying
implication in the writing,
that the author knows it won't.
And so, Dartmouth's
campus and the students
are trying to put into
perspective what this means
and they, again and
again, look to World War I
for context and to frame it
and to learn how to think about it
and to anticipate the changes
that they might expect.
Florman had another quote
which I really liked.
He said, "And I remember that fall,
"as the term started,
"representatives from the various services
"started showing up on campus
"and giving presentations
"and it was like going to the movies.
"You went this evening
and the Army's telling you
"how wonderful the Army is
and what wonderful chances
"and opportunities you'll have.
"And if you only sign up with them
"they'll leave you in college
"and then when you do go to the Army,
"you're going to be a four-star
general before you know it
"and maybe one semester,
two semesters later,
"as the war required, all
the promises were forgotten
"and suddenly dozens of classmates
"were swept off to bootcamp
"and were in the middle of battle
"before anybody really
knew what had happened."
I love this quote, he
could probably be talking
about recruiters today, in my opinion.
But, it changes really quickly
and it goes from the idea,
that abstract idea of war,
into a very serious reality.
And so, the college
responds in different ways.
The college has a
relationship with the Navy
and brings on a Naval
Indoctrination School
around this time, V-1 program,
a college air unit, the largest one
in the country, at the time.
Reacting fairly quickly, this is in '42.
The college is so
committed to the war effort
and to training students and helping
and being a part of this war effort,
that they actually sign
an indefinite contract with the Navy.
They put no limit on how long
the Naval Indoctrination School
could operate at Dartmouth,
which, to me, that was really significant
to me personally, that they would do that.
And so, the V-1 program is
an initial Navy program at Dartmouth,
it allows students to
continue studying college,
contingent on meeting the requirements
and many students join it,
but it'll eventually be replaced
by a program called the V-12.
So, things don't stay
the way that they were
when the war starts.
The draft changes, lots
of changes happened,
and one of them is the low draft.
So, the draft gets lowered down to,
I guess, about 18 years old
and this one student's reaction to that.
They wrote in The Dartmouth
in September of 1942,
"This, in fact, means
every damn one of us.
"The novelty of facing a
call to military service
"has worn off, it is no
longer a wild discovery,
"it is simply a part of
contemporary living."
And so, again, we've got that shift
from the abstract idea of what war is
to a very real reality that
they're going to be called up
and they are going to go.
This naturally has
pressures on enrollment.
The draft had extreme downward pressures
on enrollment in liberal arts colleges
around the country.
In 1941, Dartmouth saw the largest,
highest enrollment in it's history.
And by fall of the next year, of 1942,
the college saw it's lowest
enrollment in 20 years.
Something like, 1,982 students enrolled
and it was just a massive switch.
And so, we see that again in '47.
The class age is very small.
The average of a student
for the class of '47
went down from 18 years old,
which it had been for the previous decade,
to about 17, because again, of the draft.
And by 1944, the college
only grants degrees
to 51 students, and that's
combining two classes,
that's '44 and '45.
So that's how small
civilian enrollment was
at Dartmouth at one point,
which is interesting because you see
similar numbers in World War II.
And so, a lot of colleges are facing
serious financial pressures
as a result of the draft.
Dartmouth was not immune to this
but President Hopkins
made serious commitments
to the students that Dartmouth
would stay open despite the pressures.
Saying that, as this article shows,
"That we can absorb a
deficit for a few years,"
but President Hopkins said more than that.
He said, "Colleges like ourselves
"can live through these years on our fat.
"Many of our smaller institutions
"of private endowment
will be squeezed out."
He also said, "From time to time,
"from the time of it's foundation,
"before the War of Revolution until now,
"Dartmouth has never closed
it's doors for any war
"and that the college would remain open
"as long as there were any students."
Which, to me, is an incredible commitment.
As long as there's one
civilian student here,
Dartmouth would keep it's doors open.
Just to put it in context,
by 1942 most colleges had lost 30% or more
of their student bodies
and in the article to the left here,
its quoted, "That
education as usual is out.
"Every ounce of energy is now devoted
"to prepare men and women
"for the fight against
Nazism and fascism."
And so I have another quote
from Peter Beck of '45,
who is also in the Oral
History of Rauner's Library.
He said, "Then later
on, as the war heated up
"and everybody knew that they were soon
"going to headed off to God knows where,
"there was a sort of feeling of, you know,
"you'd lost control of your future,
"so eat, drink, and be merry,"
and this again, a
narrative that transcends
war conflict, decade, time,
of a loss of agency,
so what does it matter.
This is the V-12 program.
This is also a picture from The Dartmouth.
It's a little grainy but
it was one of the best
that I could find, these
are all V-12 trainees
lined up on the green in formation.
It was a massive program.
So, the V-12 begins in 1943
and there was about 2,000 V-12 trainees
on Dartmouth's campus.
It replaces the Navel
Indoctrination School
and the whole campus, basically,
is completely taken over.
And I have a map that I found
in the government contracts of Rauner,
this is Dartmouth College at the time
and everything in green is
green color penciled in,
these are all buildings
that the V-12 took over.
So they include, New Hampshire,
Topliff, Ripley, Woodward,
Smith and College halls.
And just like a ton,
the whole campus changes
in support of the V-12 program.
And so, these are students arriving
for the V-12 program.
The top is, I think they called it
something different at the time,
and those are students
lining up for their orders
and the bottom is students
lining up for their classes.
And everything changes.
So in 1943, the smallest freshman class
in years matriculates and the college
starts imposing stricter rules on life,
banning alcohol,
female visitors are banned past 7:00 p.m.,
and fraternities are
done, they're suspended
because there's just no civilian students
to be a part of them.
The Dartmouth, as a newspaper,
is suspended as well.
It's left aside for the moment
in favor of The Dartmouth Log,
which is written by the
V-12 naval trainees.
And even the gym becomes an armory.
South Mass is now a sick bay
and there's pictures of
people getting their shots
which I couldn't include
but I wish I had now.
The gym is an armory,
it's amazing what they
put in the gymnasium
and there's even contracts
about remodeling the gym
when they're done with it
and it being the correct
color and fitting in.
And so, the V-12 program is a solution
to the fact that the draft is scooping up
all the young men, 18 and up.
There's nobody graduating college
to fill the role of officer
in the United States Navy.
The Navy needs officers
so they partner up with colleges.
Dartmouth has the largest
V-12 program in the country,
President Hopkins secured
that for the school
and so, basically, Dartmouth becomes,
more or less, a naval
base in New Hampshire.
It's entirely naval trainees,
very few civilian enrollment.
Things like the library bells,
they start marking time in accordance with
what the V-12 program needs,
they play certain songs
that the Navy wants.
That said, the Navy did not take
complete control over Dartmouth,
President Hopkins maintained
the decision making powers
and had a great deal of influence
and control over the program
and what would happen and occur.
But this was college life
at Dartmouth at the time.
And so, it's an all-in effort
and many professors actually teach
outside of their departments
in order to accommodate the V-12 program.
And so, that brings me
into Dartmouth faculty.
Students were not the
only ones going to war
and participating in the war effort,
this was all-in for Dartmouth
and 28 faculty men were serving
in active service in 1942,
professors were also leaving
for government service.
Let's see, departments where they engaged
in full time work for the government,
faculty left and were
given leave to do so,
was administration, archeology, botany,
economics, education, English, geology,
history, physical education, physics,
philosophy, political science,
romance, languages and zoology.
Professors from all of these
departments at Dartmouth
left to go work for the
United States government
in various war efforts.
The areas for the government
in which they worked
were the Department of State,
the War, Shipping, and
Administration Department,
the War Department, the
Department of Justice,
Defense Research Canada,
the Army and the Navy.
And so there's another article called
Forgotten Men, which was
very interesting to me,
written by a student that talks about
this faculty effort.
Quoted in the article, it says that,
"But the fact remains that Dartmouth,
"the liberal arts college,
cannot possibly survive
"without Dartmouth, the Marine
and Naval training school.
"We can be a little thankful
"that Dartmouth had not confined herself
"to the hiring of men,
important in one field,
"but uninterested in little else.
"It can indulge itself
in a pat on the back
"when it stops for a moment
"to watch the classics professor at work
"on his physics homework,"
which is a reference
to the faculty members
that taught outside of their fields
to accommodate the program.
80 faculty taught outside of their fields
for the V-12 program
and 46% of the faculty
actually taught in the V-12 program.
And so, I found a reflection
from Samuel Florman of '46
in the Oral History archives at Rauner,
about that experience and it was
a little humorous so I included it
and I found it did speak a little bit
to the experience, it says,
"Geology 13A, the professor had been told
"that the course was going to be devoted
"to aerial photography and
analysis of photography
"from the air for military purposes.
"And this was the only time in my life,
"where really, some of
us, nobody knew anything,
"including the professors and I was able
"to point out on a couple of occasions,
"mistakes that the professors were making
"and trying to figure out
"what this course was all about."
So, it's just kind of incredible,
the amount of flexibility the school had
and effort that went in
to devoting to an all-out war effort.
And so, by fall of 1944,
I found this article
and it's the only one I was able to find
over the course of World War II
that really talked about casualties.
It was fairly brief, it just says that
134 men had lost their
lives and 27 were missing
and it compared it, again, to World War I.
So, they're just constantly making
this comparison back to World War I,
where a total of 111,
according to the article,
Dartmouth men had lost their lives.
Huh?
- Or possibly 112.
- Or possibly 112, I think I caught that.
(laughing)
- [Roberta] You had to
be here this morning.
- Yes.
(laughing)
And so, it brings us to
the end of World War II
with the college marking V-E Day
and the way that the college represented,
marked it, was with a parade,
fire whistles, library
bells, chapel bells.
The people of Hanover collected
on the green around the flag with,
what the article referred
to, as solemn rejoicing.
Everyone was aware of,
and happy that the war was over,
but understanding the
massive task that lie ahead.
The parade consisted
of the Dartmouth Band,
V-12 trainees and high school students,
civilian Dartmouth students
and churches opened for special services
and prayers and the Dartmouth Glee Club
sung patriotic songs.
And so, with the end of the war,
the question of what to
do with the V-12 program
and these naval trainees
and where the college
will go from here, is permeating.
Obviously the V-12 program,
there's no need for it
anymore, so it stops
but many V-12 trainees wanted to
get a degree at Dartmouth
and being a part of that program
did not make you a student at Dartmouth,
you were not admitted,
and many of them wanted to be admitted
and wanted to continue their education.
And so, the college facilitated that,
they decided to transition to a Naval ROTC
at the school, which would be present
for a long time after.
And they even created a brand new degree,
a major of Naval Science to
facilitate the V-12 trainees
and awarded them credits
for some of their training.
And so, they had that transition with V-12
and I believe, if you had a minimum
of a 1.8 GPA, you were guaranteed,
and GPA's were very different back then,
(laughing)
but if you had that
you were guaranteed admission,
which was a wonderful accommodation
that they made for some
of these young men.
And so, the NROTC unit
had a lot of aspects to it.
They had the east wing of the gymnasium
serving as a temporary armory,
with gun mounts, range
finders, signal mass.
And they were talking about a possibility
of constructing an armory in the future,
so they were anticipating
a long relationship with the Naval ROTC.
I found this and I loved it.
It may, possibly, be the very first
Dartmouth Veteran Club,
I don't know if there were others
but it's possible.
It's definitely the first
one after World War II.
These young men gathered
and took a picture
and put in The Dartmouth,
that they were organizing to facilitate
some of the needs that veteran students
had at Dartmouth at the time.
And they weren't the only ones,
these young men came back
with their wives and their children.
So, I went through a very special file
called the Special Committee
in Academic Adjustments,
which was dealing with this issue
of veteran students coming back
and they're not the same as they were
when they left at 18,
they have different needs,
they have experienced different things,
and they were trying to figure out
exactly how to accommodate them
and facilitate a good education for them.
And these are the numbers who came back
from the different classes.
Total veterans admitting in just 1945,
so this is like right on the tail end
so I'm assuming there were more later,
I just hadn't found it, 200 were admitted.
97 of them were part of the V-12 program
and 51 were married.
And so, again and again, as time goes on
I saw stories from
veterans, alumni veterans
or students just talking about,
it was normal to see
classmates that had served
and that had wives and children,
maybe attending a sporting event,
they'd be cheering them on,
and that was a typical
experience right after the war.
The college went out of it's way
to accommodate student
veterans at this time.
The college designated Mid. Fayerweather
and South Fayerweather
as for married students and spouses.
They even furnished them
with kitchenette units.
Dartmouth expected, at the time,
20% of servicemen returning to be married.
They built Sachem Village,
so that's the origins of Sachem Village,
it was built on property
that belonged to the
high school at the time.
It consisted of about
50 prefabricated houses,
one or two bedroom cottage units,
and was temporary, so it was only meant
to be there for five
years and then removed.
And so by, like I said before,
about 50 married veterans
were enrolled by 1945.
But we have other changes,
it's not just the college adjusting
for student veterans
and trying to facilitate their educations,
we also have the GI Bill around this time
and many students at
Dartmouth used it's benefits.
It would've made a significant dent
in their tuition at the time.
For $500 per year for tuition and fees
and a subsistence allowance.
And so that brings me to
a close with World War II,
which will lead into Korea
and I think underscores these three points
that I talked about in the beginning,
that there is a really strong history
with Dartmouth and the military
and that these stories are the same
across time in many ways,
and that really, it was an all-in effort,
there was a lot of support
and really characterizes
a moral obligation
to be a part of this war effort.
And I will open it up to any questions.
(applauding)
Yes.
- How was the V-12 program
paid for, I mean, did the government
give Dartmouth.
- Yes.
- [Audience Member] The
students weren't involved in,
the V-12 participants didn't pay
out of their own pocket, right?
Or did they?
- So the question was,
how was the V-12 program paid for
and how were students financing
their involvement in the V-12 program?
So, V-12 trainees were
actually in the service,
they were in the Navy and they were paid
because they were serving
in the Navy at the time
and so they didn't have to go and fight
because they were in training,
but they were in the Navy.
And the V-12 program
paid Dartmouth College
to be present on campus
and so that definitely helped
with some of the concerns
about Dartmouth's finances at the time
and remaining open and
all of these things,
but as President Hopkins said,
Dartmouth had money at the time
and would have stayed open regardless.
- Thank you.
- Yes.
- I was wondering if
there was any discussion
about admitting women or, I mean,
I'm obviously comparing
this with World War I
and so the V-12, basically,
is the naval, I mean, it's the solution
that Dartmouth comes
up with in World War I,
that would be SATC,
basically the government is
supporting an Army unit on campus,
except at that point, all those,
all the members of that
student training corp
had been admitted to Dartmouth.
So, there are some differences
here with the V-12.
But, I mean, there was discussion,
there was actually was some discussion
in the administration at Dartmouth
about admitting women
when the draft looks like
it's going to take all
the Dartmouth students,
and then they don't do that.
I was wondering if there's
any discussion of that?
You might not see it in the newspaper,
that would have been, probably,
in the administrative records
rather than in the newspaper.
- So the question was,
was there discussion
about admitting women at the time?
I didn't see it in The Dartmouth
and I don't think that's surprising.
I think, I believe it was World War II,
I did read and article,
I'm fairly certain it
was about World War II,
where a student was reacting
to the idea of women
serving in the military
and was not supportive of that
and said something to the effect of,
"If the kitchen was good
enough for our mothers,
"it's good enough for them."
That was definitely
published in the Dartmouth,
I just have to nail down the date,
I don't know off the top of my head.
I don't know if the administration
talked about admitting women.
I know that the administration
was really ahead of the country
in joining World War II,
in terms of preparation.
President Hopkins believed with certainty
that we would join World War II
and was prepping the college,
and that may have been
part of the conversation,
I just didn't come across it.
- [Roberta] The map with the
little green colored buildings,
you said that the V-12 program
took over those buildings,
in what sense do you mean that?
Do they become military buildings?
Do they become associated
with military activities?
- Thanks, the question is about the map
with the green colors
for the V-12 program,
oh, went too far.
Okay, so when I talk about the V-12
taking them over, they're entirely devoted
to the V-12's operation.
So, the trainees needed somewhere to live,
so, for example, Topliff was a dormitory
that was completely
devoted to V-12 trainees,
it probably would've facilitated
those running the program,
in terms of controlling
what the trainees were up to
and enforcing some of
those rules I talked about,
which were bans on alcohol,
bans on women after 7:00 p.m.,
and different things about the life
of this military unit on campus.
And, the reason this
was interesting to me,
is they were contractually obligated,
the college was, to give the V-12 program
control over these buildings
so they could use it for things like,
some of the buildings were used for
training and instruction,
and others were for dormitory
and just college life, daily life, rather.
I think there was a question in the back.
- So, I hadn't realized
that the ROTC program
actually grew out of the second world war.
It did not exist before that.
And essentially appeared
after the first world war
because there was an Army
training program here,
but after the first world
war, nothing remained.
And yet, after the second world war,
you retained an ROTC program for,
because of different times, I guess.
- So, we're talking
about the ROTC program,
I'm just repeating for
the recording portion.
And for the ROTC program, awesome,
it's not just that,
it's also the degree
of Naval Sciences too.
I mean, it seems to me like it's the idea
is some kind of permanence
or sustainability of that relationship.
I think I saw a question right over here.
- So, I was just curious,
you said that only 50
seniors remained on campus?
- I had the numbers at one,
I don't remember off the top of my head.
Some very small number, yeah.
- So I was just wondering about,
who those people were
and if you saw anything
that grew out of their experience?
So first off, why are they still here?
Is it just they haven't been drafted
or are they ineligible?
- Flat feet.
- I think that the people stayed behind
would've been a combination of those
that were too young to be drafted,
because we saw younger people
start trying to go to
college, 17 years old,
right before the draft will pick you up.
And, I think it's also those
that maybe couldn't serve.
So it's a combination of the two, I think.
But I wasn't able to find
a whole lot about that
because The Dartmouth really shifts
and it's a naval publication.
It's not really student anymore,
it's devoted to naval trainees now
and written by them and edited by them.
I think, right here.
- [Audience Member] So,
was there any conflict
between the fact that there was
still a traditional Dartmouth here,
that it was another,
the two completely different entities
were living on the same place.
There must have been some--
- There was some conflict,
I would characterize it more as tension,
between the civilian school
and the naval presence.
Some of that tension revolved around
the strict rules in the V-12 program
and President Hopkins'
idea of what the campus
should look like and how it should be.
I say that President Hopkins
had a great deal of
control over the campus,
even while the Navy had
this massive presence,
because there was tension going on
with the person that was
running the V-12 program
and that person ended up stepping away
from the program and someone else came in,
and that was largely
because President Hopkins
wanted to see some changes
and then the rules became less strict
and a little bit more inline
with what he was expecting.
And so, there was tension,
but it was resolved by
President Hopkins, I would say.
And I think I saw a question over here.
- So, I was just wondering why the Navy?
'Cause we're quite a
long way from the sea.
You were saying how this is a big program,
I mean, why is it particularly
a naval operation?
Is that just because of--
- I don't know.
- I have an answer.
- Okay.
- It's because he was so pissed
at what happened with
the Army in World War I.
(laughing)
But really, that he started to cultivate
the Navy, so it was actually
a rejection of the Army, ROTC,
because he thought it had been very badly
managed--
- You have to repeat that.
- And that was one of the reasons
why he refused to have ROTC on campus
after World War I.
So, he had better opinion than they did.
- So the reason they chose Navy,
it comes down to tensions between
President Hopkins and the
Army and past history?
- Yeah.
- Okay, that makes a lot of sense.
Did I miss any questions?
Okay, I don't want to skip anyone.
Thank you so much, I really appreciate it.
(applauding)
- Now it's going to be strange
because you should just change your hat
because now you're going
to introduce Korea.
- Yes.
- She's got a lot of work to do.
- And, let's see if I
can actually do that.
Wonderful, okay, let's see if it'll let me
pull up Korea, fantastic.
Did I learn technology or not?
Okay, yes!
(laughing)
I wasn't sure if I'd be able
to get it to do it right, fantastic.
So, World War II really leads into Korea
very seamlessly, almost, I would say.
And I looked through,
this is more of a higher level overview,
through Korea and the same
will apply to Vietnam.
But again, I looked through The Dartmouth
and was literally
looking for that dialogue
and what the student experience was,
because Dartmouth's
relationship with the military,
and the campus' relationship
with the military,
to me, is very student centered
and what I found is that Korea,
although I've heard, it's
called The Forgotten War,
many times I've heard it
referred to it that way,
for Dartmouth's campus I didn't get
the impression that it was forgotten.
It was definitely present,
people were talking about it,
and the war, the relationship
with the military
that Dartmouth had really changed
the physical space of
the campus at this time,
just like we saw in World War II
with these different buildings designated
and changes that way.
But, the military
relationship will continue
to endure, as we saw through World War II.
And so, the War Stories course,
now we're getting into a little more
of the living memory
and in our War Stories course,
many of the students were able
to actually interview Korean War veterans
and Dartmouth alumni.
And this one was done by Taylor Mooney
in the class, this is a quote from
Daniel Boyd, of '53 who
served in the Marine Corps.
He said, "In 1949, the war was over,
"the nation at peace
"and most of my classmates were looking
"to eventual careers in
business or industry."
So, that characterizes the space
that we're walking into
as we begin to look at what's coming next
in the Korean War.
And when I say that the campus changed
the physical space
because of their support
of the military and their very strong
relationship with the military,
I can point to a very
specific example of Reed Hall.
So, in "The Description
of Dartmouth College",
which was kind of a publication booklet
to describe the college
to prospective students
and their parents, this is a picture
that was published there
and they actually call
it the S.S. Reed Hall.
And so, what the S.S. Reed Hall was,
I was so excited when I found this,
the basement of Reed Hall was taken over
by the Naval ROTC Unit
and it was used for all kinds of training
and this is a blueprint,
plans for the basement
related to a piece of equipment
called an Attack Teacher.
The Navy paid for all of this, by the way,
and sold all of these things,
and what it was is it
modeled after a destroyer
and these would be like
all the battle stations
that a person, and I
think that's the right
term for it, forgive
me, I wasn't in the Navy
but I think they're
called battle stations.
All of the different features
that someone might find on a ship
that they would need to train on.
And so, students in the ROTC would go
and they would do these
kinds of trainings.
The Attack Teacher was pretty cool,
I tried to figure out what it was,
but it's an old piece of equipment
so it was a little hard to find.
As best as I could figure out,
it seems to me that it
was a table of sorts,
that a student would sit under
with a periscope-like device
and practice identifying targets in a ship
for attack, and that kind of thing.
So, this was a contract I found,
in the government contracts box in Rauner,
the librarians were wonderful
and helped me find that,
this was not the only thing.
So, I mentioned that
the gym was an armory,
part of it was an armory,
they decide to move some of that equipment
into Reed Hall, so there's all kinds
of interesting things there.
They've got a torpedo, a depth charge,
a mine, a K-Gun, which I believe
was too project the depth charges,
and they move all of that in.
And so, we're falling in on
the naval ROTC presence on campus,
but then, the Korean War breaks out
and we have a draft.
And so, there are
different student reactions
and so what happened was,
when this happens it's over the summer
and I find that again with Vietnam,
when it's over the summer
The Dartmouth isn't printing
to there's not a reaction to find.
That doesn't mean there wasn't one,
so I have a student reaction from 1951,
talking about the idea
of having to go to war.
And this student says, "Yet,
if a man's got to march
"and kill and die, shouldn't
he have some ideals?
"Shouldn't he choose to give his life
"rather than surrender his life away?
"But he has no choice, he's in the Army,
"so, what the hell?
"And maybe, after all, maybe he won't
"have to fight, maybe his draft card
"will be lost in a fire
and maybe everything
"will smooth over before they get to him."
I really, this quote spoke to me
because it talks about all those things
we saw in World War II,
it's the idea that, "Well wait,
"shouldn't I have a chance
to go to college first?
"This seems a little abrupt.
"But I have no choice in
this, I have no agency,"
and then also kind of the other,
"Well, maybe it'll pass me over,"
but you know that it won't.
And so, I thought it was
an interesting quote to speak about.
And so, you've got students
talking about the war
and it's affecting them
but they don't know
about deferments, that
question is unanswered.
And, there's a lot of concerns
around the idea of being drafted,
including what branch would I go to?
At the time, the Army was where
you would be drafted into.
What would be the length of my enlistment?
That all varied based on how you entered.
And the government was
trying to find a way
to balance it and not scoop up
all of the college students
at one time as well
to avoid the problems that
led to units like the V-12.
And so, the dean of the
college actually gave
the entire college advice,
there was a huge article in The Dartmouth
at the time about what to do
and he said quote, "I firmly believe
"that any student who
wants to stay in college,
"wants to spend the minimum period
"of military service,
"will find the risk of staying in college
"subject to the draft worth taking.
"Any man in the class of '52,"
and he was also referring to '53,
"who's enlistment may prevent
"his finishing two years of college
"has more to lose than he can gain
"by enlisting at this time."
And so, there was a national narrative
of join, choose, have
some agency over this,
do it now before we do
it for you, kind of.
And the dean of the college is saying,
"Don't do that, stay in school."
Which is a different narrative
from what we see in World War II.
In World War II, the college is
literally training up students
before we even join the war
with the idea that everyone will go in
for this effort and now in Korea,
it's not saying don't join,
it's just saying, hang out for a minute,
wait until it's your turn to join.
And so, it is a subtle shift
in the message from the college
but it is a shift, I felt.
And so, what's really
cool is that you see,
at the same time, The
Dartmouth is talking about
what my entire research was about.
That ever-present
question and the relation
of the college and student to the draft
and really, the military.
And they're quoting that,
and they're talking about
that in their articles.
But eventually, this
uncertainty has some clarity
and we come to some decisions, nationwide,
about what the draft's going to look like,
what deferments are going to happen,
what the rules will be
and The Dartmouth covers that quite a bit.
And the reaction is, at
least this one aspect
is coming to an end of the nervousness
regarding the war.
And so, different things change around it.
Students, before they were enlisting
to ensure they could choose their branch.
With the new rule, students could finish
their academic year and be inducted
into the branch of their choice,
assuming that there were openings.
And this was an immediate
relief for students
but they were still faced with
a why bother attitude,
this is going to happen to me anyway,
great I get to choose my branch,
but it's kind of a consolation prize
to some of them at the time.
So there is a lot of things
that go along with the draft,
one of them is a national examination,
so you have to take a test to see
how you're doing and if you can qualify
to stay in school.
This is a quote from
Bradley Corregan of '52,
who served in the Marine Corps,
who was interviewed by Noah Reid
and Chae Yoon Kim in the War Stories
in the fall of 2018.
He said, "People who didn't pass the exam
"were drafted into the Army
"and there were a number of those
"in his experience at Dartmouth College."
And so, we have this
question of the draft,
I want to finish school,
that's the narrative going on,
how do I finish school?
ROTC.
So the Army brings ROTC
to Dartmouth's campus
and the Air Force comes as well.
This is in 1951, the Army announces
that they are bringing
their presence to Dartmouth.
And the ROTC is a way
for students to defer,
to wait, to not have to get drafted
and to be able to finish their degree.
Dartmouth categorizes
that whole relationship
in the Dartmouth "Description",
saying, "In the interest
of national security
"and the cooperation of
the Department of Defense,
"Dartmouth College offers,
"as part of it's regular curriculum,
"training courses leading to commissions
"in the Army, Navy, Marine
Corps, and Air Force."
And so, that's how the
college characterizes
it's decision to allow them to bring
ROTC onto campus and they advertise this,
openly to students, that it's a point
of attraction for students to the school.
And so, this is reflection
from Buck Scott of '51,
who served in the Army, from
an Alumni Magazine article.
He said, "I spent my Dartmouth years
"protected from service
"because I was a full-time student.
"By December of 1951, I was a volunteer
"in the U.S. regular Army
"on my way for infantry basic training,
"I thought, let's just face it,
"the fates will decide."
This is a great picture of the Army ROTC,
again, in Dartmouth's
"Description of College"
that they printed.
They grabbed pictures
from every single ROTC,
beautiful pictures, full pages,
and it's a little bit interesting though
because the ROTC programs today,
what college you go to doesn't dictate
the job you're going to
get, but it did back then.
Army ROTC students here,
when they graduated,
were looking forward
to career in ordinance.
It was specific for the
other ROTC programs as well,
which I found quite interesting.
Navy ROTC was a little more,
they had different options
than the other ones did,
but everyone got a little
bit of pay for doing it.
These are students at
Dartmouth doing a gun drill.
I thought that was a really neat picture.
And then we have Air Force
ROTC as well on campus,
again, your college dictated
your career options.
For the Air Force ROTC
it was comptroller ship,
administration, fly operations,
and things of that nature.
So by 1951, all of them
are on Dartmouth's campus.
And so, as we were
thinking about deferments
and all of these things,
The Dartmouth and having
a presence of ROTC,
we find, again, that there
is a lower draft age,
which we see repeated through the wars,
is that they start higher age
and they go down to lower in World War II.
So, the draft age gets lowered down to
8 1/2 years old and
they're expecting an impact
on the campus, President
Dickey at the time,
expected a 25% to 30%
enrollment drop in '52
and a possible loss to the college
of a million dollars.
So, all of these drops in enrollment
that we see across the wars
do cost the college financially
and they impact these kinds of questions
as the college plans.
So, I have another reflection
from Bradley Corregan of '52,
interviewed by Noah Reid
in the War Stories course,
he served in the U.S. Marine Corps.
He said, "I knew I was going to be drafted
"after I graduated, so I got on a train,
"went down to Boston and I enlisted
"in the Marine Corps."
A lot of students did this at the time.
They took some agency over and decided,
well, if I'm going to go,
I'm going to go how I want to go
and I'm going to do it
the way I want to do it
in the branch I want
to do it and so forth.
And so, this is another reflection,
this was from a Dartmouth Alumni Magazine,
from John A. Hoskins of '51,
who served in the Marine Corps,
who said, "On a beautiful
June morning in 1951,
"I put on a long black robe
"to walk with my classmates
"to receive our coveted
bachelor's degrees.
"Twenty minutes later, I was dressed
"in a green uniform,
"being sworn into the U.S. Marines."
I'm headed for graduation in a few months
and I couldn't imagine,
you go from one to the other immediately.
Again, Dartmouth College
is making accommodations
for students, they go,
from my perspective, I feel like
they went out of their way at the time.
They're awarding credit for students
who are in good standing and get drafted
in the middle of their terms,
they had different options for it,
partial credit, full credit,
and different eligibility requirements,
but basically if you were called up,
Dartmouth didn't want you lose out
on all the work that you had done
and they wanted to be
fair to their students
and to do what they could,
so this was one way in
which they did that.
Bradley Corregan, who I quoted before,
said, "There wasn't too
much interest in the war
"because we were kind
of focused in Hanover.
"You're kind of isolated
"from the rest of the world,
"we knew, in general, what was going on
"and we knew that they had
a forced draft program.
"We just accepted it and
we did what we had to do."
So even though all of this
is going on around students,
even though there's articles about it,
there's the draft, all
these things are happening,
somehow still, we have a little bit
of a Dartmouth bubble,
which I thought was very interesting.
We have it in World War
II, we have it here.
So it's a different perspective
that endures for students.
So, as you've got
different students engaged
in different ways with the
idea of having to serve,
faculty are debating on whether or not
we should be in Korea.
So, the majority supported it
and we see this across the board in Korea.
The majority were okay,
were fine with involvement
and the faculty broadly supported it.
One of the main things that they said
was that the U.S. early withdrawal
might look bad for U.S.
international reputation
and so that was one reason
that many supported staying
and finishing in Korea.
And we see another poll,
this really got my attention,
the faculty were wondering if students
would possibly, maybe not focus as much
on their academics because of
the distraction of the war.
And what they found was the opposite,
although they did note that the students
seemed a little nervous,
or something along those lines.
And the reason that they
didn't see students,
the apathy or anything like that
reflecting courses is
because your performance
in your courses was your whole reason
for getting a deferment in many cases.
And so, it wouldn't make really sense
for students to slack
off in their classes.
In fact, I would've
expected them to do better.
But basically, they saw
them doing about the same.
But I saw, over and over again,
through The Dartmouth, that narratives
of the Korean war were present.
The Dartmouth continually printed
Associated Press articles about different
newsworthy aspects of the war
and were tracking the events very much.
It was not tracked in the
way that World War II was.
It was not tracked from
the same perspective
that World War II was, by any means.
It was a drastic difference.
So, comparing the two, it might look like
this wasn't paid attention
to but it surely was.
There was a narrative ongoing throughout
the entire time in The Dartmouth
and with students, not
everyone participated in that,
some were in a Dartmouth
bubble of their own.
But this was part of what
was going on at the time.
But this brings us to
the end of the Korean War
and something I found
in the Alumni Magazine
that really caught my attention.
This is from Henry Nachman of '51,
who served in the U.S. Army
and he was present for the very final,
some of the final shots
that were fired in the Korean War.
He said, "In July 27,
1953 at 10 in the morning
"was when the war stopped,
"but not when the shooting stopped.
"At 10 that night the shooting stopped,
"it was eerie, the very last man
"who died in the Korean War,
"at 7:30 that night, was
a sergeant first class
"in my company, his
name was Harold Cross."
And so, I just thought it was,
well, it impacted me.
First, the narrative that he shared
and that we had an alum
that was a witness to this moment.
And so, with the end of the war,
as we had with the end of World War II,
the question of ROTC and the colleges
relationship with the
military is posed again,
but ROTC remains on campus
and it remains on campus for a few years,
although in a smaller capacity.
The budgets are cut and they're just
not as necessary as they were before,
that doesn't mean there wasn't a need,
there still was an ongoing,
definitely an ongoing need for the ROTC.
And so, with the Korean
War, our course had
the first living voices available to us.
We had three Korean War veterans
that were interviewed for
the War Stories course
and for all, the war was
an expected responsibility
and something that they were engaged with
during their undergraduate experience.
And so, Vitalia prepared some remarks
about one of the interviews
that she did with the course.
On a specific alumni veteran
so I'll invite her up to
speak a little bit more
about that and as we transition,
I just want to give an opportunity
for any questions that anyone might have.
Wonderful, all right, great.
(applauding)
- Hello.
So, I got out of the Army in May of 2018.
It was an interesting idea to know
that I was heading to
Dartmouth from the Army.
And so, when I was enrolling for classes
I saw a class, comparative
literature class
called War Stories and I thought,
"That would be a really
nice way to transition."
It's a really unique fear,
'cause I felt pretty brave,
I felt pretty empowered,
and I felt pretty strong,
but the idea that you're going into
a liberal arts environment
with people maybe having conceptions
of your service that would
make you uncomfortable.
To me, the idea of talking about it
in a classroom environment would be nice.
In Professor Stewart's
comparative literature class,
we explored the complex themes
of surrounding war and trauma,
collective and social accountability,
life, grief and survivorship.
And we did all of this
through the context of the war story.
We studied fiction, non-fiction,
everything from the Korean War,
the Japanese War, World War II narratives.
I don't know that we left
any war story untouched.
At the end of this class,
the culminating project was to interview
a Korean War veteran.
It was during this process
that I was introduced
to Korean War veteran,
Marine Corps Colonel, retired,
James Jerry Mitchell.
Jerry Mitchell had over 37
years of combined service,
between the Navy and the Marine Corps.
You don't often hear
numbers that high anymore.
So, he commissioned as an officer
in the Navy and the Marine Corps
after returning from the Korean War,
Jerry graduated with his MBA from Tuck.
He did work for a few years
with the Federal Reserve
and then he accepted a position with IBM
and stayed with the company for 18 years.
Jerry left IBM, came back to Hanover
and opened and operated the
Dartmouth Travel Bureau.
In speaking with Jerry, I realized
that his freshman year experience
was a little different,
but also very similar to my own.
He hopped on a bus, rode up to Dartmouth,
sight unseen, enrolled
and went to his dorm room.
There was nothing novel about it,
there wasn't anything
super strange about it,
he was ready to start learning.
It felt very familiar to me,
talking to Jerry about his experience
transitioning from living
at home in high school
and going to college.
There were a couple of things, though,
that started to come up that very much
distinguished his experience
at Dartmouth from my own.
One of his quotes said,
"Dartmouth was like you experienced,
"I came as a freshman, I got on a bus,
"changed buses to a train,
"and took the train to White River."
That sounds pretty normal.
The first few clear
differences as we spoke,
though, were really clear.
His quote, "There was a
veteran on every floor
"of Gile Hall when I came to Dartmouth."
The saturation of the veteran population
was a side effect of both
relatively consistent
service conscription
from 1948 through 1973.
And the all male student body.
In the current era of the
all volunteer service,
Dartmouth College is home
to less than 50 undergraduate students.
And that's in the light of being at war
for the last 18 years.
While many would not consider
that number significant,
it is important to note
that Dartmouth has distinguished itself
among it's peers in prioritizing
enrolling veteran students.
Jerry was a big part
of contributing to that narrative.
I did want to talk to Jerry
about the way that the
shadow of conscription
can change the way that you engage
with the Dartmouth College,
and your education in general.
And this was another point
that I started to notice a
very different experience
between what I expected
and to some degree,
what I think I would've projected
on my older veterans.
Jerry didn't feel a shadow.
He didn't notice a shadow.
Almost half of his class had served.
He intended to serve.
It wasn't novel to him,
the idea of service.
And he said, "It was just my reality."
In Jerry's sophomore year,
his brother left home for college as well
and he decided to take a couple years off
and go ahead and seek a commission
in the United States Navy so that he could
ease the financial burden on his family.
And there is another distinction.
The idea that you would willingly
step away from your education,
not for some higher calling,
which a lot of people
maybe would attribute
that decision to, but his consideration
of his family and their
financial struggles
and the idea that maybe going to war
was the best way to ease that struggle.
So, Jerry applied to and was accepted
to the Naval Academy
flight program as a cadet.
In March of 1950, Lieutenant Mitchell
started his flight training
the Naval Air Station in Whiting Field
and completed his first
solo flight in April 12th.
At this point in the interview,
Jerry's wife, I was
welcomed into their home
right here in Hanover, at
this point in the interview,
Jerry's wife hopped up and just left.
She just left the room,
which I thought was interesting
but she'd been bringing us tea
and facilitating a
discussion the entire time.
She came back with stuff.
There were pictures, there
were flight uniforms,
there were medals, there were models
of his big girl and his little girl,
both his favorite aircraft to fly.
One of the pictures that she brought out,
Nancy brought out, was a picture
of his squadron holding their guidan.
This picture was especially
significant to me
because one of the members
of the squadron was a black man.
David Plowden was the third ever
negro aviation cadet.
"There was no problem
whatsoever, not that I knew.
"We had the same aerial
number, same MOS number
"and they were a part of the group."
I struggled with this concept
of this casual reference
to integration in the Army,
or sorry, the Navy.
It was a time in this country
where it was really really difficult
to discuss integration and race.
Jerry didn't have that problem.
There was a quiet professionalism
and a really really deliberate respect
for professional proficiency
that transcended race
and it was also on the heels of,
sorry, it was especially significant
because it was on the heels
of the integration of the
military force broadly,
under the Truman administration.
So Jerry, who attended
an all white high school,
attends flight school with the third black
aviation cadet ever
admitted to the program
and then less than two weeks later,
on June 25th of 1950, the
professional practicality
with which Lieutenant Mitchell's wing
approached integration
would prove fortuitous
as the government of North Korea
attacks the sovereign
nation of South Korea
and this team was going to be headed
to a Marine Corps, mobilized for war.
As we continued through our interview,
we started touching on Jerry's transition
from training as a cadet
to an active duty pilot.
In 1951, 2nd Lieutenant James Mitchell,
received his orders and headed
to a tommy airfield in Japan
and then on to Kaiwan Poseung, Korea.
He was given his final assignment
with the VFM 212 in Pohong.
Again, this is when Nancy hops up
and does something really funny.
She goes and grabs another box of things
and she's like, "Jerry,
you should tell her
"about your award."
I am 100% convinced that Jerry would not
have mentioned his award,
had his wife not prompted him to do so.
Jerry received the
Distinguished Flying Cross
while he was in service
to the United States Navy.
It's awarded by the president
of the United States for heroism
or extraordinary achievement
while participating in aerial flight.
It's a very significant award,
one of which, Jerry would
not have mentioned to me
had Nancy not prompted him to.
In late August of 1952,
2nd Lieutenant Mitchell
provided close air support while under
direct fire for a fellow downed pilot
in the Wonsan Harbor area.
Now, the significance of that,
sometimes you have to go through
and translate military awards
because they can sometimes be sanitized.
The significance of Jerry's actions
is that there was a downed pilot,
the pilot was in an
effort, trying to survive,
and Jerry was providing cover.
The part that you don't
understand necessarily,
in that award language, is that the same
anti-aircraft weaponry that downed
the previous pilot was shooting at Jerry
while he was operating his aircraft.
So, this is when I get really excited
because you don't get to have
these kinds of conversations often.
Every effort that I made
to properly aggrandize
Jerry's actions, was minimized.
It was not important.
It was actively refuted.
Every time he said, "I just did my job.
"When I was caught in
a difficult situation
"all I did was survive."
When asked if it was his job
to leverage his safety
to keep someone else alive,
he replies with a casual, "Yeah."
And I think he was
just too polite to say, "So what."
Jerry stayed in the area,
providing cover fire for that pilot
until he was forced to land
in a nearby airfield
because his plane ran out of gas.
He realized the weight of his actions
only after someone told him
that he would be receiving the award.
And he calls it a small
award by his reckoning.
2nd Lieutenant Mitchell
left the Korean War
after flying 88 successful missions
and receiving four air
medals for his efforts.
Upon completing his
active duty commitment,
Jerry returned to Dartmouth College
to finish his bachelor's degree
and check in with the local reserve unit
where he would fly
with the Marine Reserves of New England
for 19 more years.
Life after Korea was
a little bit different
but primarily because Jerry began school
as a 17 year old freshman
and returned as a 22 year old senior.
That's something I kind of
have in common with Jerry,
I'm a 30 year old sophomore.
(laughing)
His service allowed him to use the GI Bill
to attend school for free
and he was accepted into
Tuck Business School
immediately following graduation.
When his friends asked Jerry what he did
while he was supporting the Korean War,
this is another moment that I recognized
a difference, I think it's a humility
that has been codified into men like Jerry
and men who have a history
of service, like Jerry.
"I got nine credits for being
"an officer and a gentleman.
"Six credits for learning how to fly.
"And I spent my junior year abroad."
(laughing)
That was both an incredible summation
of his military career,
but it also, it very
succinctly demonstrates
the kind of humility
and a little bit of self deprecation
that a lot of these individuals
who have served our country historically
tend to provide.
Jerry's practicality and quiet strength
and obvious humility was evident
when I was discussing
putting his education
on hold to support his family.
And to serve his country.
Ease the burden on hard working parents.
And the assertions that
he was just doing his job
when saving the lives
of fellow Navy pilots.
Jerry presents a humility
and quality of character
that winds thematically
through our interview.
The likes of men like
James Jerry Mitchell,
class of '51, have inspired
schools like Dartmouth
to invest in veterans.
That investment is why I am here.
I am a female, black,
queer, veteran student
at Dartmouth College.
And I'm the child of a single mother.
It was never my wildest dream
that I could end up in a place like this.
And that I could end
up in a place like this
without insurmountable amounts of debt.
And the GI bill and Dartmouth College
has gone out of their way
to facilitate that experience.
My participation at an institution
like Dartmouth College is predicated
on the efforts of brave souls
who, both quietly and loudly,
and in different ways,
demonstrated practicality,
kindness and steadfast belief
in the defense of what is right.
All right, does anyone have any questions?
(applauding)
Any questions?
Yes.
- Well I was thinking
that when he left
Dartmouth to go into the military,
that was before the war had started.
So, I was putting this together,
so he didn't necessarily think
he was going to war.
- Right.
He did it so that he could
ease the financial burden on his family
and then he ended up at war.
- Yes, I think that probably wasn't,
I mean, I think that was probably
something that was fairly
common in that period
because it's a generation
that's come after World War II,
so service in the Army is something
that lots of families
or expect or whatever,
and so, yeah, I'm just
putting those things together.
I think probably other
men would probably done
the same thing of the experience.
- Can I speak to that?
- Sure.
- Actually you're right.
One of the things that we saw, I think,
across the student interviews
for the Korean and
Vietnam era of veterans,
are the number of ROTC students
and many of them are responding to
financial considerations
for their families.
There were lots of motives
for ROTC participation
but very many Dartmouth students
talked about coming to Dartmouth
and using ROTC as a way to mitigate
the cost on their families.
That said, just this
weekend a Dartmouth alum
said to me that the three characteristics
of Dartmouth that he
had to impress upon me
for the sixties were
one, women weren't here.
Two, the campus was largely, mostly white.
And three, the whites were privileged.
And that he contrasted
today, as a good thing,
as a changed campus, but yet, and still
across the interviews,
Vitalia's interview,
very very many of these interviews,
the young men spoke about ROTC
as something they did to help with college
as a natural decision.
- I think, there's a lot of conceptions
about the generational wealth
that Dartmouth produces
and I think it was really interesting
to have a conversation with a veteran
who had to overcome the productions
or perceptions of generational wealth
by taking time off and
serving his country.
I thought that was an interesting nuance
that I think a lot of students
and a lot of people overlook in general.
Any other questions, yeah.
- [Audience Member] So having
done the War Stories class
with Professor Stewart, in leu of that,
how is your participation in this class
shaped your Dartmouth
experience overall after?
- So, the question was how has it shaped
my overall experience at Dartmouth?
So, Professor Stewart's War Stories class,
I think, was a really great introduction
to the liberal arts education.
I was sorely misinformed
about what a liberal arts education was.
I heard the word liberal
and being from the South,
I had a very interesting conception
of what I was about to be meeting
up here at Dartmouth.
And I've come to learn
that liberal arts is less,
a very small box about thinking
and more interested in exposing you
to a litany of different things
that you learn how to think.
Her class showed me
that the type of student
that I would engage here at Dartmouth
would not be the kind of
student I was expecting.
I was expecting a class of.
(laughing)
I think we read the news
and we hear a lot about
entitlement, we hear a lot about
demanding, lazy, young people.
And I was ready to butt up against that
and I learned in that class
that these students are a little bit more
deliberate and a little bit more diligent
and a little bit more open minded
than I thought they were.
I was expecting everything
from baby killer
to even worse slurs than that,
and what I got were really
thoughtful questions
about how war shaped my life,
what does trauma look like,
how can we support veterans,
and what's missing in
support for veterans.
So, it shaped my experience
here at Dartmouth
in the sense that I see my peers as peers,
not as youth or lazy, young people.
They're my peers and
I can learn from them,
and that was interesting.
Any other questions?
All right, thank you.
(applauding)
- All right, I'm not
that great with the tech
but I'm going to transition into
my presentation on Vietnam.
Sorry everyone.
(laughing)
Let's see if I can get
to the correct slide.
Oh dear, oh dear.
Hmm.
That's weird.
It seems to stuck there,
I'm sorry, give my one moment.
Okay.
Oh dear, please work.
I sure hope it works.
Okay, maybe we're good now.
Perhaps.
Oh, thank goodness, okay, wonderful.
Sorry, my apologies everyone, okay.
So, I'm going to speak a little bit
about Dartmouth and the Vietnam War.
As we transition from Korea,
I've just prepared, again,
as a general overview of Vietnam
and what I found through my
research in The Dartmouth
as a window into the
voices of the dialogue
on campus and the happenings.
And so, I think what we would probably
all expect to see is a lack of support
for the war in general,
and that is what I found
largely in The Dartmouth,
by faculty and by students
and what it culminates in the end of
the Vietnam conflict
is a loss of the military relationship
between Dartmouth and the military,
sorry, redundant.
And so, I wanted to start, again,
just setting the scene with an interview
that I had the privilege of conducting
with George Bohlinger, of '63,
who was in the U.S. Navy.
He took the time to speak with me
and I was very appreciative of that
and very privileged for having
the opportunity to do so.
He said that, "Back in those days,
"even if no one was
interested in fighting a war,
"there was a much stronger feeling
"of owing the country something."
And I think that that was very reflective
of the country, the campus,
the student body at the time,
a sense of duty, a sense of
service as we exit Korea.
And then, of course, we all know about
the Gulf of Tonkin Incident
and the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution,
authorizing U.S. military
action in response.
And so, this is from an interview
in the War Stories course,
done by two students, Alex Rivlen
and Kyle Zemer in the fall of 2018.
The interview was with
Ronald Brown of '68,
who served in the U.S. Army.
He said, "In the summer of '64,
"my parents and I drove up to Dartmouth,
"Johnson had just announced
"the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.
"I remember sitting the motel
"watching it on television
"and that was probably the first
"very real awareness that something
"was about to happen,"
and he couldn't have been more right.
So, we've got the Vietnam War kicking off,
things are happening
and the United States
Army is communicating
with Dartmouth and President Dickey,
about how important the ROTC program is
to the United States Army,
to the war effort, to the nation,
and to the Secretary of the Army himself.
Secretary Ailes wrote in his 1965 letter
to President Dickey
that, "The ROTC program
"is of singular importance to the Army
"and to the defense of our country."
He said, "I am sure that we can
"count on your continuing support."
I think this is a little bit of an appeal
for continuing support.
He was not exaggerating when he said
it was of singular importance.
45% of the Army's 100,000 officers
came from the ROTC at that time.
World war officers were retiring
and the Army was anticipating a larger
and larger role for ROTC candidates.
The ROTC at the time provided the Army
with 22 times the officers
that West Point provided
and 85% of second lieutenants
were ROTC graduates.
These were all facts that Secretary Ailes
shared with President
Dickey in his letter,
underscoring his perception
that there was a continuing need
for the presence at Dartmouth's campus
and the desire to facilitate
that relationship.
And so I go on to continue
to quote Mr. Bohlinger.
He said, "Nobody was
looking at the military
"as a career, you were doing your duty."
Again, with the sense of service.
I specifically asked him whether or not
this was a career option for students
because I was curious.
Were people looking to do this
for the rest of their lives,
or, why were they joining at the time?
And this was why, it was,
again, a sense of service.
Another interview from War Stories course
done by Alex Rivlen and Kyle Zemer.
Mr. Ronald Brown of '68,
who served in the Army said
that he was just talking
about that sense of duty
of some students at Dartmouth
to serve their country.
One specific was a
freshman named Rod Smith
that he encountered who was a class '70.
Mr. Brown said he had a conversation
at the end of his fall
term with this freshman
about the idea of leaving
to join the Marine Corps
and that he would "Always remember
"sitting up on the fourth floor,"
I believe it was New Hampshire Hall,
"in the corridor on the floor
"having this conversation with him.
"The bottom line was
that this student felt
"he was given enough to have been able
"to go to college, but
that that wasn't a reason
"for him to not, in
his terms, do his duty.
"He ultimately withdrew from school,"
and this student, Rod Smith,
"joined the Marine Corps in late '67."
But not everyone felt that way
about the military and some alums,
some students who went
and served and came back,
in the case of Anthony Thompson of '64,
who served proudly in
the United States Army,
did not receive a warm reception
from particular students.
In this case, Mr. Thompson was relaying
an experience he had in an interview
with Jack Schmidt and Ubaldo Lopez
in the War Stories course.
He said that he was in a fraternity,
on Dartmouth's campus,
and was called by a brother a moral coward
for having served in Vietnam.
So, there were many opinions
and many of them very much so conflicting
at this time on Dartmouth's campus.
Another alum, Robbie Holmen of '72,
who served in the United States Army,
was quoted in the Alumni Magazine,
having said, "It was virtually unanimous.
"People were opposed to the war.
"Bob Dylan was saying,
"'The times they are
a-changing,' and it was true.
It was definitely true
in Dartmouth's campus.
There were protests that happened.
This one happened in May of '68.
The ROTC used to have awards
that they would give their students
for their performance in the programs
at the end of the year.
This one was in the spring, in May.
And you can see the picture
of them receiving awards.
For this particular
ceremony, about 300 people,
a mix of faculty and
students protested it.
But this is just a preliminary, a lead-up,
this is the occupation of Parkhurst Hall
where anti-ROTC dissidents seized it.
They completely occupied it,
barricading themselves in.
Police had to remove them
and they were arrested,
some were expelled,
and this was in direct reaction
to the presence of ROTC on campus,
there were many many students on campus
that believed that ROTC
should not exist here,
that it should be ejected from the campus
and that in no way
should Dartmouth College
facilitate any relationship
with the military.
And so, Douglas Lamude of '65,
who served in the United States Army,
was asked about this and he said,
that with regard to Vietnam,
sometimes he would talk to
some of those that were against it
and maybe protesting perhaps.
He said, "How can one be so sure
"of one's position if one cannot
"even find that place on a map?"
He would ask them if they
could point out Vietnam
and some of them couldn't.
He said, "It seems to me
that such basic information,
"if one can't find it on a map,
"I'm forced to ask myself,
"what else is this person missing
"about this issue or topic or position?"
So, there were just many, many,
different conflicting views on campus.
But this interweaves itself
with a national dialogue of protests,
and The Dartmouth covered
that along the way.
There are many, many articles
about different activities
on a nationwide scale
and this one is of a
massive protest in D.C.
where a quarter of a million
protestors showed up.
And this leads us into the draft.
December 1, 1969 the Selective Service
does the very first lottery since 1942,
and The Dartmouth covers it.
Just to put it in perspective, broadly,
the number of inductions
that we see in Vietnam
are about 1.8 million
and the number for Korea is about 1.5,
for the total war.
And, it's a little ahead of myself,
but it was worth mentioning
that the last person who's inducted
would be June 30, 1973.
And eventually, students
that want that ROTC,
that military relationship severed
at Dartmouth's campus,
and I'm sure some faculty as well,
they win and the ROTC
does agree to exit campus.
The question really, at this point,
is not whether ROTC will stay,
it's how they're going to
withdraw from the campus
without causing harm to those students
that are enrolled in these programs.
Many of them had money involved,
scholarship type,
I think scholarship
might be the wrong word,
but there were funds associated with it
and different things.
And so, that was the question
and that dictates some
of the withdrawal dates
that we see, 1973 is of note,
that's the withdrawal date for the Navy.
I think it's interesting
that the last two withdraw
probably because they have
the strongest relationship
and perhaps higher student involvement
in the program, which
would mean more students
would need to be able to
stay in the program the full four years.
But what we'll see is that,
at least for the Air Force,
they don't stay nearly as late.
They don't even stay 'til '71.
The last student that the Air Force has,
which is acknowledged in this letter
to the trustees in '74,
the very last student
they have in their program is in 1968.
So, there's waning
student interest as well.
And so by 1970, there is the idea
of having a college strike nationwide
in reaction to Nixon's announcement
of involvement in Cambodia.
This is The Dartmouth article about that.
The very next day after that article,
we have articles about Kent State.
The one on the left is about
the incident with Kent State
where the university students are shot
by national guardsmen and
the article on the right
is President Kemeny
announcing that classes,
the whole college is going to
take a break for a week
and suspend everything.
I think in part, this is a reflection
of what had happened
previously with Parkhurst Hall
and an avoidance of maybe
incidents like that,
but also, clearly for reflection,
clearly to think about it
and to think about what positions
we should hold on the war
and how we should respond to all this,
and they do do the whole week long.
In fact, you see articles.
People who were interested.
So, referring to what happens
to these students when ROTC is gone.
And in his experience and his memory,
they went to Norwich
University over in Vermont.
But the whole Ivy League dropped out.
It was a massive protest
against the idea of
having this connection.
This was not unique to
Dartmouth in any way.
But it's not just ROTC that ends.
All of the changes that happened
at the end of World War II,
where we see the degree of
naval science introduced
and ROTC and all these relationships
with this idea that
they'll probably endure,
they're gone.
Between 1972 and 1971,
the ORC no longer mentions
the Degree of Naval Science.
So that's not a part
of the college experience here anymore.
And so, The Dartmouth does cover
when the Vietnam Accord is signed.
January of '73 there's a cease fire.
March of '73, the last combat troops
leaves South Vietnam.
And I found a reaction
in the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine
by Warren Cook, a '67,
who served in the U.S. Marines,
just characterizing the end of the war
and how he felt about it.
He said, "Everybody totally
avoided discussing it.
"There was no acknowledgment
of what we did.
"Thank you for your service,"
did not even appear, "in
people's vocabulary's."
And so, these are all just some of
the perspectives at the time,
this last one is just
one perspective of many.
The War Stories course
that Professor Stewart
put on the fall featured interviews
that students did with many alumni
from the Vietnam War
and all of them had
different perspectives.
And so, I would like to pause for a moment
for questions and then invite Paula up
to talk about one of her interviews
with a particular alum.
So, are there any questions
that anyone might have?
Okay, wonderful.
Thank you.
- Thank you, hello everyone,
good afternoon.
My name is Paula and before I start
I would just like to thank Nataly
for this amazing presentation
she put together.
And Professor Stewart
for allowing me to
contribute in the panel.
While I was preparing for my presentation,
I not only felt the usual nervousness,
but I also pondered, what is it
that makes war stories so
captivating for writers?
When revisiting my paper from last fall,
I realized that war stories
have this special power to inspire,
but also to captivate brutal reality.
Before taking the War
Stories course, however,
I only could remember one book
that captivated me.
Tim O'Brien's, "The Things They Carried".
This book not only motivated me
to take the course,
but also, helped me to choose one of,
Mr. Frondorf, one of the many veterans
who participated in the Vietnam War.
Those of you who know and read the novel
can understand how excited I was
to interview Mr. Frondorf
and finally meet with the
real heroes of Vietnam.
However, at the end of October,
when I could finally set up
my interview with Mr. Frondorf,
to my biggest surprise I did not meet
with the idealized trauma hero of Vietnam.
Neither did I hear a recap of O'Brien's
dramatic jungle stories.
What I heard turned out to
be far more interesting.
The interview with Mr. Frondorf
revealed a new perspective
of the Vietnam Conflict at Dartmouth
and challenged a literary perspective
of the Vietnam War.
Last, but not least, it questioned
the representation of
the ex-military personnel
as a trauma hero.
As an international student
who is not an expert at Dartmouth history,
I was excited to learn a new perspective
on the '60's general anti-war movements.
Mr. Frondorf's testimony not only showed
that Dartmouth, at the time,
was a place of political contradiction
but also pointed out,
the students of the college
managed to build meaningful relationships.
Dartmouth, although considered, quote,
as an extreme place of liberalism,
was represented both by conservative
and anti-war sentiments.
For instance, shared Mr. Frondorf,
when I showed up as a freshman
I was assigned to a faculty advisor.
I had a guy who was a French teacher
and he asked me what I was going to do.
And I said I was
interested in architecture
and being an English major.
I also mentioned that I
was interested in ROTC
and he spent the next half hour
trying to talk me out of it.
According to Mr. Frondorf,
who was a student in the
ages of 1965 and '69,
the faculty of Dartmouth College
almost unanimously objected the war
but the students experienced
an equality divide.
Although substantially feverish
to join the military
during the Vietnam Era
than World War I or World War II,
the members of the Army, Air Force,
and Navy ROTC programs
still applied to service.
Approximately 10% of the student body
could have signed up for service.
Although the protests against the ROTC
and the counter protests against SCS
were recurring events on campus,
the students body continued
to have an open dialogue.
Peaceful interaction and dialogue
between ROTC members and
conscientious objectors
were not obliterated.
Mr. Frondorf, for example,
managed to develop and maintain
a meaningful relationship
with his roommate,
who was a conscientious objector.
"My roommate," he said, "was
a conscientious objector
"but I had plenty of friends
"who were in ROTC with me.
"So I had a range of friends
"who were either against or not.
"From my friends at Dartmouth,
"it's that roommate that
I still regularly see.
"And of course he was
a captain of industry.
"Now it seems a little bit ironic
"that he was a conscientious objector.
"Never the less, he's a great guy."
As we can see, their friendship proves
that with an open mind,
some of the students of Dartmouth College
could bridge ideological
differences and manage
to preserve Dartmouth's
legacy for inclusivity.
Dartmouth's history, however,
was not the only perspective
that I was revealed after the interview.
To my biggest surprise,
Mr. Frondorf's testimony pointed out
that the traditional Vietnam War hero
portrayed as a victimized pacifist,
was not always the real-life protagonist.
In fact, many citizens supported the war.
Mr. Frondorf was one of
the many young adults
who supported the national agenda,
prepared and was looking
forward to service.
As a member of the ROTC at Dartmouth,
and a son of a Navy officer,
he was excited to get into the Hustlers.
With his international experience
as a child growing up in the Philippines,
he considered that the
U.S. should intervene
and he wanted to walk the walk.
When he first arrived to his ship
he desperately wanted a job
and wanted to do the whole thing
as correctly as he could.
His experience suggested
that besides the stories
of brutalized and dissolutioned war hero,
there is space for a
narrative of preparation
and conscious choice.
But, the solution meant of the '60's
national propaganda and
the anti-war movement
created a literal legacy
of reasonless war,
featuring the dissolutioned war hero.
Mr. Frondorf highlighted
that we should not
accept the narrative
of the counter culture
as the only experience.
None the less, Mr.
Frondorf's international
perspective and cross-cultural experience,
questioned a culture shock narrative
using many Vietnam War novels.
Indeed we could ask, what is it,
what else would make a better war story
than a hero who battles with culture shock
and unpredictability of nature?
Even in my favorite war novels,
like Tim O'Brien's "The
Things They Carried",
the narrator highlights the discomfort
caused by the unfamiliarity
of the environment.
After talking to Mr. Frondorf, however,
I recognize that the culture shock
of young American soldiers
is not the only narrative.
Mr. Frondorf, who spent his childhood
in the Philippines and
had broader world view
did not experience culture shock.
None the less, arriving
in Vietnam in 1971,
a relatively peaceful year,
Mr. Frondorf was in a safer position.
Although his initial experience
when flying in included, quote,
"The unusual sensation
"that there are people down there
"that want to kill him."
He quickly settled into
the normality of Saigon.
Since 1971, the political powers
already started negotiations
and the process of Vietnamization,
Saigon was a relatively
safe and reachable.
He pointed out that he was probably
one of the very few people
that was actually visited
by his parents in the war zone.
"Vietnam was a country," he said,
"you could fly in, fly
out, and do business there.
"My parents actually
had moved to Hong Kong
"and they just flew in to Saigon
"and I met them for dinner."
Therefore, the experience
of 1971 around Saigon
could not have been represented
by the same novels as the
jungle combats of '68 and '69.
While the dream to meet
with the combat hero
did not ultimately came true,
I learned that war novels try to capture
a general experience but they simply
cannot elaborate on the
thousands of eccentricity's
and multiple experiences.
But, as a war story fanatic,
I often looked for the definite answer
in war literature, I learned
that the truth of war
can only be discovered
through the multiplicity of perspective.
Last but not least, Mr.
Frondorf's testimony
challenged the literary
tradition of homecoming
and a portrayal of Vietnam veteran
as a trauma hero.
In his article, "The Trauma Hero",
Roy Scranton points out that there is
a special myth embedded in war literature.
Quote, "Every true war story," he claims,
"is a story of trauma and recovery.
"A boy goes to war,
"his head full of romantic visions
"of glory, courage, and sacrifice.
"His heart yearning to
achieve heroic deeds
"but in the field of the battle,
"he finds only death and horror.
"He sees, suffers, and causes
"brutal and brutalizing violence.
"Such violence wounds
the soldiers very soul.
"After the war, the boy, now a veteran,
"and the man returns
to the world of peace,
"haunted by his experience.
"Wracked by the central compulsion
"of trauma and atrocity.
"The struggle between the need
"to bear witness to his shattering
"encounter with violence,
"and the compulsion to repress it.
"The truth of war, the
veteran comes to learn,
"is a truth beyond words,
"a truth that can only be known
"by having been there,
"an unspeakable truth he
must bear for society."
Resulting from his unique
experience in Vietnam,
Mr. Frondorf shared a homecoming
and re-integration story
that was entirely different
from the formally described
mainstream narrative.
He pointed out that individuals
can positively benefit
from military experience.
"The military in general,"
he said, "had in itself,
"confidence, direction, or organization."
Besides his self improvement,
Mr. Frondorf also had the
exceptional opportunity
to maintain a position of
leadership at a young age.
As a leader of 26
soldiers at the age of 23,
he not only learned to direct himself,
but also discovered how to lead others.
He resolved that the road to leadership
is not only about rank
and the skills of a good
leader in the military
are the same as in civilian life.
He reminded me that besides trauma
and dissolutionment, the Vietnam War
literary legacy should leave space
for narratives of self development.
All in all, Mr. Frondorf's
experience in 1971
revealed that time, space, rank,
and previous own experience
can generate different war stories.
Therefore, any war, but especially Vietnam
must be represented through
the multiplicity of narratives.
There is no true war story
but there's truth in every war story.
And in order to get a holistic picture
of Vietnam, the civilian reader
must interact with multiple veterans,
read multiple stories,
and engage with the
war on multiple levels.
Thank you.
(applauding)
Any questions?
Yes.
- [Audience Member]
Could you tell me again,
what did he do,
I know you said it in the beginning,
but what was his career
after he left the military?
- Oh, he became, actually
went to graduate school
for architecture and she still remained
in the reserves for, I think, 30 years.
- So, it's interesting it connected
with your interest in architecture.
- It is, yes, it's really funny.
I was surprised by it
when I looked up his bio
before the interview,
I was really surprised by that.
He also had this interesting point about,
she really liked being
part of the reserves,
or he, sorry.
Pronouns, not an English speaker.
So yes, he loved being
part of the reserves
because he felt that he could
talk about something else
than actually design in his industry.
So that was very interesting.
Yes.
- My question is a little bit more general
than just your discussion.
It seems to me that one of the things,
it's a curious thing to put your finger on
is that when NROTC leaves here,
ROTC leaves here, it's cold turkey.
That is to say, wasn't there some other
kind of way for Dartmouth,
educational institutions
across the country,
because this happens all
up and down the board,
continue to have a relationship
with the United States military.
And is there now, today,
a kind of recouping of some of those
kinds of possibilities.
I know, for example, a young person
who's just graduated from
the Coast Guard Academy
came to Dartmouth for a training program
which had nothing to do with Dartmouth.
But she has to take it
through the service, up here,
to, I think, in the weather research area.
Are there programs like that
that are now functioning
that bring Dartmouth and
the military together?
- I can help, yes.
Dartmouth, it's a shame to leave it off
at Vietnam in a way,
because Dartmouth does come back
and reestablish a relationship
with the military, for sure.
There's Army ROTC now on campus.
A lot of veteran students and Tuck,
and of course, there's us and
the undergraduate population.
So, there is a definite relationship
going on today, for sure,
on Dartmouth's campus.
- Yeah, I can speak to that too.
So, I'm in the women's basketball team
and actually one of our freshman
is in the Army ROTC
and she is supported by the ROTC program
through funding her education.
So, it is an ongoing relationship.
Yes.
- May I add just a little
bit to that as well?
My name is Dan Fang and there's another
side of this as well, I think,
service that's worth thinking about.
I've been on the board
here for seven years
and I'm a Marine veteran.
So I was very interested in the topic
of trying to reestablish
some of these ties.
But, you tend to see it from
the perspective of the
educational institutions,
not welcoming the relationship
with the military.
DoD is also very cost conscious
in establishing these relationships.
So, what we ran into in talking with
the Army and the Navy was,
they effectively said,
"Hey, we get more bang of our buck
"putting a program at
a big southern school
"than we do putting a
program at Dartmouth."
And so, there are two parties here
and I think it's part of a broader
(microphone noise) the
military moving south,
moving west, moving from urban to rural.
There's no Coast Guard,
or no Air Force base on Cape Cod anymore,
there's not a Navy base in
Maine anymore, a big one.
I mean, people, partly because
you can't buy a house
at the end of the runway
and complain about the jet noise, right?
So, it's part of this larger trend
of almost a great sort,
the sifting in our society.
And frankly, in my seat,
I hold DoD to task on some of this
as much as I would.
- Absolutely.
- I think there's this
kind of curious
segregation that's going on
that really disturbs me, intellectually,
in terms of the separation.
I'm actually from Omaha, Nebraska
(trails off quietly)
off of the Air Force Base there
so that we are racked with military a lot.
But, I think areas like this,
when I come back and
put on my Dartmouth hat,
it seems like it's a very distant reach.
- [Dan] I agree with that
and I think Dartmouth is just a part
of anthropological society
(trails off quietly).
- Vitalia?
- Yes.
That notion of DoD accountability,
I think is really important.
I went to go speak with
my vocational rehab
counselor the other day
and she said it was more cost effective
for them to have me transfer
to Southern New Hampshire University.
And so, right.
And so, here I am trying to,
having to advocate for myself
with the person who's
supposed to advocate for me
and trying to convince me
that the institution that Dartmouth is
and all of it's benefits
are probably not in my best interest.
And so, there's a really
interesting conversation
happening right now,
but there's also the other side of it.
Veterans tend to be skeptical
of the idea that institutions
of higher education,
particularly Ivy League institutions,
are sincerely invested in them.
You know, Dartmouth has
been really successful
in increasing it's veteran population,
but prior to that they
were working with Posse.
And so, through that program,
having an initiative to recruit veterans
to apply for and buy in to Dartmouth,
they were just skeptical.
They didn't think that an institution
like Dartmouth would want them.
And that they would be
able to go for free.
I mean, I am here for free
and it is still mind blowing.
And so, that DoD accountability
is really important because I think
we need to start prioritizing education
amongst veterans in the same vein
that we need to hold
these schools accountable
for not making their
educations always accessible.
It goes both ways.
- I'd just like to throw in.
So, having attended
Dartmouth and also Columbia,
as a veteran and dealing
a little bit with that,
am I good enough to get an interview,
will they want me,
I would say if it wasn't for the work of
Jim Wright, specifically here,
actually walking the halls of Walter Reed,
and actually recruiting
veterans to go here
and being instrumental
in the Post-911 Bill,
it was really a game-changer
in helping Dartmouth
change that perception
in the Ivy League and drawing veterans
into the program, and
it's still a challenge.
You know, even today, you have to
actually get out there
and talk to the guys
and girls that are
separating and tell them,
"Hey, you do stand a chance.
"You do belong there.
"You can add value to that community."
But it's a larger challenge
that we have to overcome in society.
- Just, the veteran interest in 1970,
the medical school,
they opened a program, the medics program.
It was an effort to take corpsman medics
from the military students
and bring them to the medical school
and train them to be
physicians assistants.
And that went on for five years.
And I was in the second class
and we were quite an array of characters
to let loose on the campus back then.
(laughing)
I won't tell you how interesting--
(laughing)
It was quite an amazing time.
But, that effort,
I've spoke with the people here about it
and there seems to be
no zeal to do that again
but I thought it was
one of the greatest uses
of the talent and the training,
and it was also a saving
grace for a lot of us.
I'd been a teacher in Special Ed
before I got drafted
and when I got out of the service
there were no jobs in teaching
because everybody was seeking a deferment.
So, it was a saving grace for me.
- [Audience Member] So,
along the lines of Jim Wright
being a very important for us,
do you know who started this program
in the medical school?
- I know it wasn't Jim Wright.
I spoke with Jim Wright about this
and he didn't seem to have any interest
in pursuing it, but I had
spoken to other people.
I'm not sure it was,
Dollace Trumps was a colonologist then.
She was a primary person in this
and then there were a number of people
who were involved in the development
with computerizing medicine.
They thought that having
physicians assistants
spread out through New England
and a lot of us were in the
National Health Surveys.
They got us spread out through New England
to make accessibility and availability--
- [Roberta] That's fantastic.
- And it was a pretty exciting thing,
I remember we were
introduced to using computers
and algorithms, also to fancy stuff,
for education, it was a remarkable effort.
I don't think it's quite
come to the fruition
that the people had hoped for.
It was one government entity.
- Well, I want to thank everyone
and I especially want to thank
the undergraduate presenters.
And, we are going to
take a 30 minute pause
and then have our final panel
with the alumni veterans at four o'clock,
we'll reconvene and again,
and I want to say, if
anyone knows Jerry Mitchell,
you should send him a card.
He's very dear to me but I think
he could use a card right now.
So, I want to thank the undergraduates.
(applauding)
