Matt's Experience with the Veteran's Oral History Project at UCF

 Welcome to Week 6 of this journey with the Veterans' History Project! Work-wise, the load was relatively light this week, with a focus on reorganizing many of the past semester's files and making an account of what is missing from past interviews. Although tedious, this organization is critical to the success of the entire program and our ability to properly archive these valuable oral histories. This will be my main focus over the coming weeks.  A highlight of this week was the field trip that all the Public History Interns took as a team to the Orange County Regional History Center in downtown Orlando. This is a museum dedicated to the preservation of Orange County and the surrounding region's history and heritage. It was a great opportunity to learn more about the region and the field of public history. The trip started with a hands-on display of a variety of military history artifacts ranging from WW1 to the Global War on Terror. This included the opportunity to take h...

 Welcome all to week 5 of my journey with the UCF Veterans' History Project. I was able to hit the ground on real contributions this week by beginning to process the interview of Paul Bertram from April of 2025. My tasks for the week consisted of writing the AV log and Abstract for the interview. It was really exciting to finally be able to process real stories, and it was fascinating to listen to and analyze Paul's life and experiences. As I said earlier, this was my first experience working with a real interview like this, and I really enjoyed it. It took a lot longer to complete than I thought it would, but I barely noticed the time. I was so focused on Paul's testimony and enthralled by his story that it did not seem like work at all! As a veteran myself, I found a lot of similarities in his story despite our decades apart. I was also stationed in Pearl Harbor and lived near Waikiki, which is something he did for a significant portion of his career as well. He was a ver...

 Welcome back to week 4 of this journey!! This week was the most action-packed that I've had so far, and it was full of great and exciting information. So far, this internship has been a game of catch-up for me. I was a late addition to the Veterans History Project team, and so am a step behind in the process from my peers. However, this is the final week I will be playing catch-up. This week, I completed all of my training and orientation materials and attended my first team meeting. I received access and training to Microsoft Teams folders and began to familiarize myself with the actual work I am going to be doing.  The orientation and training included a wide variety of tasks and items, but were very manageable. These tasks primarily consisted of watching training videos and recording meetings that I had missed due to my late start. The recorded meetings were important for introducing the overall structure of the internship program and for meeting my fellow interns. The tra...

 Welcome all to Week 3 of the Blog! This week was exciting as I was finally able to start learning more about the internship! On Thursday, I met with Jessica Oldman, who gave me and another intern a rundown on the process. We talked about the different phases of the process and how to complete important aspects like the planning process, how to fill out the Bio-data sheet, and the AV log, among other things. She showed us some materials, like a picture and letters from a Gold Star veteran's family, and talked about how important this project is to her and our history as a nation. It was inspiring and exciting to hear her talk about something that she is clearly so passionate about.  Now that I've had my introduction to the project, the tasks I have for this week are to do a variety of things. Chief among these is to complete the training assigned and review 3 previously completed interviews. The three interviews I will be reviewing are of Major John Haynes, Donald Parting...

 Welcome to week 2 of my internship blog with the UCF Veterans Public History Program! This week was uneventful, and there isn't much to write about, so I'll provide you all with a brief overview of the program and its past activities. Thank you all for your patience, and I promise some more engaging material is on its way soon!  The UCF Veterans History Project was founded and put together in 2010 to document and preserve the stories of the Veterans in our community. The history of our country is not complete without the eyewitness testimony of the people who experienced and lived through some of the most tumultuous and impactful moments in our nation's history. Veterans who are interested can apply on the project's website, and while most are logged in to UCF's own database, some stories will be sent to the Library of Congress to be archived there. Over 600 veterans from our central Florida community have contributed their stories. This project continues to be...

 Hello!! Welcome to my blog about my time with the UCF Veterans' oral history project. I am an undergraduate intern working on the project and will be writing this blog to document my experiences. I am extremely excited to get started and am looking forward to the adventure that awaits me. Documenting these veterans' stories is a vital part of our history as a nation and as a community. I am honored to be able to contribute what I can. Throughout this semester, I will be posting weekly blog posts sharing my thoughts on the work that I and my fellow interns have done. However, this first week did not contain much substance, so I thought I would take this opportunity to introduce myself, give you all my background, and explain how I ended up here.  My name is Matt Fedewa. I grew up in southern Michigan, and as far back as I can remember, I have always had a passion for history. I loved learning about the past and how people have survived and overcome the many challenges that hum...