Duke And University Of North Carolina- January, 2020
The exhibit was displayed at the University of North Carolina History Department and the Duke University Divinity School with the support the Divinity School’s Center for Reconciliation. Borrowing from an idea that originated with the exhibit at George Washington University, the North Carolina Veterans for Peace chapter sponsored an essay contest to encourage area students to take a deeper look at the exhibit.
The forum at Duke was introduced by Robert Korstad, Professor of Public Policy and History, Sanford School of Public Policy and moderated by Adriane Lentz-Smith, Associate Professor, Duke History Department. Panelists included:
John Balaban, a poet and professor emeritus, North Carolina State, was a conscientious objector who served and was wounded in Vietnam while working at a children’s hospital that was bombed during the Tet Offensive in 1968. His first collection of poetry After Our War was nominated for a National Book Award.
Greg Payton, U.S. Army, Vietnam 1967-1969, member and spokesperson for Vietnam Veterans Against the War and Black Veterans for Social Justice. He has told his story to audiences in more than a dozen countries on five continents.
Douglas Ryder, a U.S. Navy veteran, who was stationed aboard the USS Duluth LPD 6 off the coast of Vietnam in 1967 and participated in seven amphibious assault operations. He is president of Eisenhower Chapter 157 Veterans for Peace and a member of NC Peace Action. His ship was listed by the U.S. government as having been exposed to aerial spraying of Agent Orange. Ryder is an eloquent speaker on the issue of moral injury.
Nicholas Harrelson, a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute and a wounded Iraq combat veteran, is a student at Duke Divinity School studying to become an Army chaplain.
The reception at UNC was sponsored by the University of North Carolina Department of History and the Curriculum in Peace, War and Defense and included some of the same panelists. The smaller pop up exhibit was located on the fifth floor of Hamilton Hall.
