News

We were saddened to learn the news of the passing of our friend, Easy Company veteran Bill Wingett, who we were honored to have travel with us on our Band of Brothers Tour. In his honor, Senior Historian Chris Anderson shares a beautiful and personal remembrance of Bill. Read More

We are delighted to share this wonderful tour memory from Wayne Frye about meeting Easy Company veteran Bill Wingett while traveling on the Band of Brothers tour. As you will read, Wayne was honored to develop a friendship with Bill, who recently passed away. Read More

Senior Historian Chris Anderson leads our WWI: War to End All Wars Tour. Chris has spent considerable time researching and studying the First World War. After college, he moved to the UK for a year to interview British veterans of the Great War. Later as assistant curator at the Historical Society of the Militia and National Guard, he was able to interview many surviving American Doughboys. Chris often gets asked by guests about what books to read before going on the WWI tour. Here is an informal list he updates as he reads new books. Read More

War changed in the 20th Century. With civilians as much a target as anyone else, what it meant to be a combatant changed as well. Senior Historian Chris Anderson’s most recent History Hikes post, a race-with-death story about the Royal Engineers who defused a bomb under St. Paul’s Cathedral during WWII, illustrates just how true this statement is. Read More

On the 76th anniversary of the start of Operation Lüttich, the German advance on Avranches in Normandy, we’d like to share two videos that Historian Kevin Hymel recently appeared in on WW2TV. Read More

Senior Historian Chris Anderson's latest History Hikes blog post, recognizes the 80th anniversary of the Selective Service Act of 1940, the peacetime draft. Also known as the Burke–Wadsworth Act, Pub.L. 76–783, America was in a post-WWI period of isolationism, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the act into law, a response to rising fascism and totalitarianism in Italy, Japan and Germany. Read More

On the 76th anniversary of the start of Operation Market Garden, we’d like to share a video that Historian Kevin Hymel recently appeared in on WW2TV, “First Boots into the Netherlands.” A week before Operation Market Garden, the American 30th Division fought for the Dutch town of Noorbeek. It then became the first part of the Netherlands liberated. In “First Boots into the Netherlands,” Kevin discusses the Rhine Rat Race battles with local historian and battlefield guide Frank Gubbels, who is on the ground the Netherlands for this historic occasion. Read More

Historian Chris Anderson has been thinking about his friend and mentor Richard “Dick” Winters a lot recently. Probably because this is the time of year when he is in the midst of a Band of Brothers Tour and he's missing the thrill of showing people where Easy Company made history. Since the COVID crisis has prevented him from walking the ground, he thought there might be some interest in how the original Band of Brothers Tour came to be. Read More

WWII History magazine has published historian Kevin M. Hymel’s latest article, “Armored blitz to Avranches.” In the article Kevin covers Tech Sergeant Gerald Griffith. Kevin interviewed him about his experiences in World War II as a flight engineer on C-47 Skytrain aircraft. Read More

WWII began today in 1939 when Nazi Germany invaded Poland and plunged Europe into six years of death and devastation. The other anniversary that occurred this month was the 1920 “Miracle on the Vistula,” when the Polish army changed history with the repulse and sound defeat of the Soviet Red Army as they approached Warsaw with the goal of spreading the Bolshevik revolution throughout western Europe. Norman Davies, Professor Emeritus of the University of London and a Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford has written several books on Polish history. We are fortunate to offer this article on the history of Poland from him to share with you on these solemn anniversaries. Read More