Department of History Washburn University
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Department of History Washburn University Fall 2016—What We did on our Summer Vacations Message from Dr. Tom Prasch, chair On a Saturday in mid- Austin Harris had just was now talking about the September, I found myself finished delivering a Reverend Billy Sunday’s sitting at a table in front of masterful analysis of civil career; it was the subject of one of Henderson’s large religion in Woodrow her just-finished dissertation, lecture halls. It’s not Wilson’s presidency. In the but, having read that work as usually someplace I’d pick audience, alumna Cara each chapter was drafted, I to spend a weekend Burnidge was listening recognized that this was new afternoon, but what was particularly intently, but that material, outtakes as it were, going on made it worth was no surprise: she had crafted specially for the the extra day in the consulted closely with Harris conference. Looking out over classroom: we were in the when he was working up a the classroom, I could see midst of “’Endowed by longer version of his paper a colleagues from the Their Creator’: Historical semester earlier in Alan department, students (some Perspectives on Civil Bearman’s course on civil who would be presenting Religion,” a one-day pop- religion and the American that afternoon, others just up conference we had put presidency, and her own there to hear their peers), together when we had book on Wilson, A Peaceful and some of the senior realized that a certain Conquest: Woodrow Wilson, auditors who regularly critical mass of our Religion, and the New World showed up in history classes. students, faculty, and Order, had just come out (she alumni were engaged would be giving us work And what struck me most with studies connecting to from that in our lunch-hour about this moment was not the ways in which religion keynote address). Jennifer how well our students were and political ideology Wiard, a graduate (class of carrying themselves in this intertwined in American 2006) who had returned to sort of public forum history. Washburn to adjunct for us (although they were Lorem Ipsum handling themselves amazingly well), or how those who had gone through our In Memoriam program (like Cara and Jennifer) were still engaged with “doing history” (our program’s motto), or even how good the Phil Morse (BA History, new work my colleagues were producing ’63) passed away after a was. Rather, it was the deep collegiality of long illness. He was the the moment: how students, faculty, father of Kim Morse. alumni, and interested constituents had all Though Phil never gathered on that afternoon to share their made money as a research, exchange views, and explore historian, he was, in his history together. It’s the sort of event that heart of hearts, a makes me certain that we are doing historian. He knew that in order to know who you something right in the Department of are you have to know where you came from. In the History. last twenty years he was able to become a historian, writing first a fine history of Topeka’s That was early in the semester, and much first decades. He then tackled, with wife Lona, his has happened since then. A month or so magnum opus, a massive, thoroughly researched later, Alan Bearman would shepherd three of the students who had presented at our family history that traces Morse and Shreffler lines pop-up conference (Chloe Mooradian and to their beginnings in the colonies. As Phil made is Mallory Lutz as well as Austin) to Virginia career in real estate, he and Lona traveled Beach to present their work at the biennial thousands of miles to dozens of county courthouses national Conference on Faith and History. to trace land records. They then had to locate the Later in the semester, we brought Cara land, and, if possible, burial locations where Lona used her emergency cemetery supplies. No one is back to campus for a well-timed and illuminating forum on Islamophobia. I ever forgotten. Phil read copiously to understand spent some time later in the term the context in which the families people lived and compiling our once-every-five-year the forces that shaped their lives and the Program Review, finding much to brag communities in which they lived. All of that is in about in our last half decade’s work the book. Even after his illness robbed him of the (including an outstanding record of ability to type he spoke his writing into special innovative courses, like the one Alan software to continue the work with an urgency of a Bearman created that fed so well into our man who knew time was his enemy. So much of conference). who Phil was is in that book, what he valued, what defined him. Much more is in the offing: new courses like Kelly Erby’s sing-along (not really, but you can hum quietly) “Alexander Phil lived a life defined by educated, well- Hamilton,” or Kerry Wynn and Tom researched, thoughtful community service. In his Averill’s “Digital Storytelling” course, or last productive years the History Department was Rachel Goossen’s new offering fortunate that he shared his time, skills, and “Remembering Vietnam”; more students wisdom with us as judge for the paper competition presenting their work at conferences; a for History Day. When his disease did not allow slate of new activities by our Phi Alpha him to serve anymore he endowed the Phil Morse Theta chapter. Keep up with our doings Scholarship to be awarded to the winner of the by keeping connected: follow us on paper competition. Phil believed deeply in the FaceBook, keep us updated on address value of a liberal arts education as the core of a life changes, or just stop by the department to well lived, service performed with integrity, so it visit. was logical to provide History Day students with help down that path. 3 This past summer, Dr. Rachel Goossen was awarded a Sweet Sabbatical for a travel and study trip to Vietnam and South Korea. A historian focusing on U.S. twentieth-century history, she regularly teaches courses on the Cold War. Her visit to these countries in May/June 2016 focused on memorialization of the Vietnam and Korean Wars, including visits to museums, cemeteries, and historic sites, as well as conversations with family members of soldiers who fought in the Vietnam War (from both north and south); and in the Korean War (from both north and south). She traveled to the former demilitarized zone in Vietnam, as well as to the current DMZ at Camp Bonifas along the South Korean border with North Korea. Emerging from one of the Cu Chi Tunnels, a wartime center that now serves as a tourist destination outside Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Since returning to Washburn, Goossen has been developing a new upper-division history course, “Remembering Vietnam,” which she’ll teach in the spring of 2017. In October, Phi Alpha Theta and the Department of History sponsored her illustrated lecture, “Vietnam in 2016: Four Decades After War’s End.” Goossen’s summertime conversations with young Vietnamese —whose parents had supplied the Ho Chi Minh Trail and fought in the late 1960s and early ‘70s—framed her campus presentation about how Vietnamese citizens regard the legacies of what they refer to as “the American War.” Goossen presenting a seminar in Chuncheon, South Korea, Goossen is also a scholar of Anabaptist history, and in these east Asian settings, she gathered teaching materials on the development and history of Mennonite and Anabaptist congregations. At the invitation of Anabaptist leaders in Chuncheon, South Korea, on June 3rd she presented an afternoon-long seminar at the Korean Anabaptist Center (KAC), titled "John Howard Yoder's Life and Theology." Theologians, graduate students, church administrators, and book publishers from Seoul and Chuncheon attended her presentation on this renowned 20th-century American theologian and ethicist, whose legacy includes decades of sexual abuse of women. Goossen's seminar on Yoder was translated from English into South Korean by KAC's executive director, BockKi Kim. Lorem Ipsum Undergraduate Mallory Lutz researches Black Resistance to School Desegregation In August I began researching African American resistance to desegregation in Topeka leading up to the Brown case as part of an internship I am completing with the National Park Service at the Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site. My essay, “Separate is Unequal, but not Unwelcome: African American Attitudes Toward Desegregation Before and After Brown v. Board of Education,” focuses on black Topeka in the first half of the twentieth century, examining how some black teachers, administrators, and families hesitated to desegregate the public schools in their city. I find that many black Topekans feared desegregation because they believed it would harm their children not only physically, but emotionally as well. Some of them also believed desegregation discouraged racial pride and forced children into environments where they were “merely tolerated.” A number of black teachers further emphasized the unique perspective they brought to their classrooms, stating that they were better able to connect and empathize with their students during the era of Jim and Jane Crow. White teachers, they argued, were unable to understand the everyday experiences of black children and black working-class families. Because teaching was one of the only professional positions open to blacks during this era, teachers and administrators enjoyed significant prestige and leadership in the Topeka community. Desegregation thus also risked the possibility of job loss or demotion for black teachers. While I include some evidence of black families who did indeed wish for their children to attend white schools, most of my research focuses on black families who were content with their own schools and teachers.