Dr. Dan Clayton has been a history professor at Regis University for 22 years. He also is director of the Center for the Study of War Experience at the university.
For 12 years, the university has offered a class that combines with a public lecture series called “The Stories From Wartime,” featuring veterans who experienced war firsthand.
The presentations are scheduled each Tuesday from 6 to 8 p.m. through April 24 in the Science Building Amphitheater at Regis University, at West 50th Avenue and Lowell Boulevard. The series website is warexperience.org.
Q. Tell me about your lecture series.
A. It’s our attempt to bring to life the experiences of war veterans through their own stories. They are the storytellers. By doing this, we hope to have a deeper appreciation of what people do in war and what war does to them. We’re trying to deepen our understanding of war experiences, and we do this by inviting men and women who experienced war to bear witness.
Q. How did it get started?
A. It got started in 1995 when three of us in the history department were intending to do a course on World War II. We realized the only way we could teach about war was by hearing from people who fought it and experienced it on the battlefield, on the war front, those who administered to sick and dying – the whole range of experience of wartime.
Q. How does a public lecture fit into the curriculum?
A. The lecture series is part of this class, which is a research writing class, where students in their junior year of college do a major seminar paper based on primary sources. Our subject matter is war experiences, so the students are writing about war using the testimony of the people who were there.
Q. Tell me about the “public” part of it.
A. From this class grew this public speakers series. At our first class the other night, the Science Building Amphitheater was filled to capacity. We needed an overflow room. We make it known that the general public is invited. It’s co-sponsored by KEZW 1430 AM radio, and the series is moderated by Rick Crandall, the station’s program director and morning-show host. It’s a radio station that caters to this generation. It’s the seventh year with this partnership. What that has meant is that we are in the public eye, so we have people from all over the metro area there on Tuesday nights.
Q. What’s been most interesting about the mix of the public and students learning together?
A. There has been this neat intergenerational thing – college students with World War II veterans and Vietnam veterans. This is living history taking place, and students are really drawn to that.
– Joey Bunch, Denver Post staff writer
