By Jaci Schneider, Copy Editor
Dr. Vernon Williams needs four or five interns to help him compile research for documentaries and a book about World War II, although the application deadline has already passed.
Williams has already made four films documenting different aspects of World War II, and one, called, Deopham Green: The Saga of the 452nd Bomb Group in WWII, won first place at the National Broadcasting Society competition.
Williams’ documentaries and his book focus on the communities formed in England when American troops based out of small towns.
“There’s hundreds and hundreds of stories,” Williams said.
Williams needs interns to help him transcribe interviews, and build databases of diaries and photographs. Although the interns won’t receive a paycheck, they will receive significant benefits, Williams said.
“This will be a significant resume item,” he said. “It’s very unusual experience.”
The interns will work from three to 10 hours a week, and they can make their own schedules, Williams said. The internship will last the whole year, not just this semester and can count for honors credit.
Williams said he plans to begin writing the book in January, but the interns will work on the project, “East Anglia War Project,” as a whole.
“The book is something that will come out of it all later,” he said.
One story that illustrates Williams’ passion for the subject, is the story of Jack, a World War II flier who was stationed at an Air Force base in a small town. When Jack would return to the base after flying, he would visit with a British family, playing cards, going to the pub and doing laundry.
“It was one thing that made them sane,” Williams said, “a home away from home.”
However, one day Jack didn’t return from his flight, and officers picked up the laundry he had left in the home. The family assumed he was dead, but at the end of the war, Jack, who had been a prisoner of war, listed the English household as his family and returned.
“There’s such a sense of community that developed,” Williams said. “That’s my quest: to find these people and interview them.”
Students interested in interning for Williams can visit e-mail him at vwilliams@acu.edu.
