HIST 208Z – Historical Research and Methods Seminar:
War, The University of Maryland, and Twentieth-Century America
Sample Topics
Multi-era or topics that can be broken down into a particular time:
 A study of ROTC activities on campus
 A selected biography of an alumnus/a or faculty member who served in the military or
took part in a war-related event (Gordon Prange and Milton Reckord are two examples)
 The role that a particular campus organization (for example a fraternity or sorority)
played in a given conflict (victory gardens, scrap drives, a bus of students to a protest on
the mall, etc.)
 a comparison of campus coverage of a particular war-related event compared with local
or national coverage
 comparison of student handbooks from World War II and the Vietnam War
 Military recruiting on campus – men and women
World War I:
 an exploration of the specialized training programs run by the Army on campus during
World War I
 effects of war on campus
World War II
 Civilian Public Service Camp 116 – Camp for conscientious objectors at UMD
 Specialized Army training on campus
 Recruiting programs on campus
 Red Cross activity on campus
 Student life during the war
 Student war loans
 Impact of war on athletics
Cold War/Korean War
 a history of the creation of Memorial Chapel
 effects of the G.I. Bill on campus
 expansion of campus after World War II
 Cold War related government funding on campus
 Veterans’ activities on campus
Vietnam War
 1967 national meetings of the National Student Association (NSA) and Students for a
Democratic Society (SDS) on campus
 a comparison of the design and construction of the university’s Vietnam Memorial and
the one on the National Mall
 a history of the campus chapter of Students for a Democratic Society
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a study of campus debates over expulsion of the leaders of the protest that shut down
Route 1
Student protest from the point of view of
o University of Maryland administration
o University of Maryland faculty
o University of Maryland students
o University of Maryland alumni
o College Park residents
o University of Maryland Police Department or the National Guard
Coverage of student protest in
o Campus publications
o National newspapers
o Local newspapers
Long-term effects of protests on campus governance and policies, particularly on policies
regarding demonstrations
Relationships between the Vietnam War protests and other protests that were occurring
nationally and on campus at approximately the same time (e.g. women’s rights, civil
rights, gay rights, etc.)