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History is coming alive for Emily Goldberg ’05 (Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.) this year as she transcribes interviews and pages through World War II-era periodicals for a professor’s upcoming book.
Goldberg is working as an EXCEL Scholar with Donald L. Miller, John Henry MacCracken Professor of History. In Lafayette’s distinctive EXCEL Scholars program, students work closely with faculty on research while earning a stipend.
Miller has received critical acclaim for the book The Story of World War II, published by Simon & Schuster/Lou Reda. PBS recently aired a four-hour American Experience series based on his book City of the Century: The Epic of Chicago and the Making of America, which won a Great Lakes Book Award. Miller played a multifaceted role in the production of “Ulysses S. Grant,” a four-hour American Experience program that premiered on PBS television in May. He also is lead scholar and on-air host of “A Biography of America,” a PBS video series and telecourse, and has played significant roles in other PBS series.
Goldberg is transcribing audio taped interviews provided by the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum in Savannah, Ga. She says an interview with Sherman Small, an Eighth Air Force pilot during World War II, made the war come to life.
“He talked about getting hit,” Goldberg says. “He talked about the guys on his flight crew. I got a very big sense of the camaraderie they had.”
Goldberg and Lauren Sheldon, a junior English major from Somerville, N.J., have also been reading articles from World War II-era issues of the military newspaper Stars and Stripes and periodicals such as Life and Fortune. They are making note of publications that will help Miller with research for his upcoming book on the Eighth Air Force in World War II.
Miller chose Goldberg for the year-long research project because he was impressed with her writing skills in assignments for his Civil War class.
“She’s very bright,” he says. “She has a good eye for picking out compelling anecdotes and human interest material, and she has enough grounding in the subject that I can trust her to select articles that are going to be of use to me.”
Goldberg, who plans to major in history or government & law, says working with Miller is “such a great opportunity” and “good preparation for whatever I do.”
Goldberg has acted in College Theater productions, serves as recruitment liaison for Hillel Society, and is a member of Forensics Society. She is an Adopt-A-Grandparent volunteer through her sorority, Delta Gamma. Last summer, she learned about public relations while interning at Multi Entertainment, a Miami-based production company.