Barbara Gannon, associate professor of history and coordinator of the , has been involved with the Supply Vault for Student Veteran Success since the project’s inception.

“Our vision is to use this vault as a way of welcoming veterans to the UCF community,” says Gannon. “Veterans’ homecomings can be difficult, but we want to use this to ease their transition to UCF and higher education.”

The vault offers a collection of school supplies selected by student veterans for student veterans, including noise-canceling headphones, wireless keyboards, voice recorders, blue light glasses, smart notebooks and external hard drives. These items are provided to student veterans at no cost.

“We also want to introduce them to the UCF Community Veterans History Project,” Gannon says. “We want them to know that we value them and their stories. The supply vault is also a tangible way of letting them know of our gratitude for their service.”

Fundraising for the vault came from the 2019 macramé Yellow Ribbon Project. In partnership with the Central Florida Yellow Ribbon Project and local artist Victoria Walsh, UCF students, faculty, staff and community members macraméd trees lining Memory Mall. Twenty-eight of the 30 trees were sponsored by colleges, departments and organizations, including the College of Arts and Humanities.

For history student Michael Richardson, the vault holds a personal significance. As a U.S. Navy veteran, he’s closely familiar with the struggle of returning to civilian life following military service, not to mention the difficulty of adjusting to life as a full-time student.

“The adjustment from service really was a nightmare,” Richardson says. “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do — going to classes. I would literally drive all the way and sit in my car, but I wasn’t able to go in. I dropped out of school for about three years.”

With the help of therapy and getting involved with the Florida Department of Veterans Affairs, Richardson was able to return to his studies and found a passion for history. At UCF, Gannon recommended he get involved with the Veterans History Project. , he became a research assistant with the project and was instrumental in the planning and execution of the vault.

“I started doing research, and I started looking at all the stuff around me that I had been using,” says Richardson. “And I’m like, ‘OK, these are the tools that have made me successful as a student; things that I’ve had to kind of piece together for myself for the last six years.’”

Richardson’s experience as both a veteran and UCF student gave him a unique perspective when planning and procuring items for the vault. Having experienced the difficulties of reacclimating to civilian and student life himself, he understands how simple items such as noise-cancelling headphones and voice recorder pens can make a huge difference in the day-to-day life of student veterans.

“There are so many triggers that a lot of [student veterans] won’t even know they have,” he says. “If I can help them avoid even one stressor in their day — helping them to get over those hurdles will help them be better Knights.”

The project, led by Amelia Lyons, associate professor of history and director of graduate programs, will engage UCF students in research and writing about veterans’ graves and monuments. In addition, UCF faculty and students will collaborate with Central Florida schools to produce interactive curriculums for K-12 students and organize a field trip to the cemetery in Bushnell, which is the county seat of Sumter County.

Involving students of all ages in the project will engage the community with the service and sacrifice of veterans, and will give undergraduate and graduate students a real-life lesson in professionalization, Lyons says.

“This experience with primary research — from identifying the subject and stories, to analyzing the sources to produce a narrative and becoming a published author — is like no other,” Lyons says.

“Learning about the lives and stories of these soldiers is also teaching our students what a historian does,” she says. “It makes history real for them.”

Luke Bohmer, a history graduate student, recently participated in a field research day at the cemetery. “It is vital to go to where the history is, whether it’s a cemetery or an archive. This is more humanizing and palpable than any statistic could ever be,” he says.

Janelle Malagon, an undergraduate, says that she has “always had an interest in military history, and the VLP was a great hands-on experience where I had the unique opportunity to learn the stories of individual soldiers throughout American history.”

The corresponding website exhibit created by the research team — including Scot French, digital historian; Amy Giroux, a computer research specialist in ; and graduate student assistants — will use software to map the research virtually, and UCF’s RICHES Mosaic Interface to create a digital archive.

The public will also be able to participate in the project through an interactive element at the cemetery. Giroux will lead the team in the creation of an augmented-reality app, which will include student-authored biographies of veterans for visitors.

Students are already aware of the impact the program will have. Malagon says the digital components will allow relatives to learn something about their veteran in a way that would not have been possible without the technology available today.

The Florida National Cemetery is one of 135 cemeteries overseen by the VA. Team members recently visited the site to begin their research.

UCF researchers have already begun integrating assignments for the project into their graduate and undergraduate courses.

Students, including those in Lyons’ Modern Europe and the First World War class and Professor Barbara Gannon’s War and Society classes, are conducting research, searching for any documented history on the veterans whose graves will be selected.

Undergraduate students are excited to participate in the project.

Kristina Himschoot comes from a family with deep military roots.  Her parents met in the U.S. Air Force, and both her grandparents served.

“The VLP is becoming more important to me every time I learn something new about it,” she says. “I have the utmost respect for this project.”

Anson Shurr expects he’ll draw a deeper, more personal connection with veterans through his research.

“Seeing their graves in person, epitaph and all, is personal enough. But once you realize that in many cases they lived in the same town or street as you, or you see a surname you know, it really hits home,” he says. He was particularly struck by the fact that people his own age put their lives and dreams on hold to fight in a war.

Kenneth Holliday, who is both a student and U.S. Army veteran, says that because April 6 marks the 100th anniversary of the nation’s entry into World War I, the research is especially timely.

”We are in the centennial of World War I. There is no better time to recognize the service of these veterans,” Holliday says.

Graduate students in Professor Caroline Cheong’s Seminar in Historic Preservation course are helping to identify the graves and monuments to be included and are photographing the sites for both the webpage and the app.

French, associate professor and director of public history, is having students in his Viewing American History in the 20th Century class create interactive digital materials for use on the website. John Sacher, associate professor of history and liaison with public schools, is integrating the results of the project into K-12 curriculum that will be available for use in schools across the U.S.

In May, the UCF team and local middle- and high-school students will travel to the cemetery as a kickoff event for the program. UCF student researchers will interact with younger students at the cemetery, providing what Holliday sees as “a much more personal connection on an individual level. Instead of remembering the major battles and the big names of military and political leaders, the students and local residents can remember that at the heart of the conflict were average people that all of us can probably relate to in some way.”

Gannon, who is also coordinator of UCF’s Veterans History Project, says that because the university engages with veterans and rich history in creating extensive interactive exhibits and web-based tools, the funding doesn’t come as a surprise.

Other schools selected by the VA’s National Cemetery Administration for the project are San Francisco State ����ֱ�� and Black Hills State ����ֱ��.

“The award of these three contracts signifies the VA National Cemetery Administration’s dedication and commitment to providing enhanced memorialization and lasting tributes that commemorate the service and sacrifice of veterans,” says Ronald Walters, interim undersecretary for memorial affairs.

The contracts are the first of many planned initiatives to engage educators, students, researchers and the general public through the Veterans Legacy Program. For more information, visit the on the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ website.

The Orlando Naval Training Center, which was in operation 1968-94, was where the Baldwin Park neighborhood now sits. The Navy League of the United States – Central Florida Council is raising money to create the patriotic memorial in the neighborhood’s Bluejacket Park.

The remembrance will include a Lone Sailor statue and a 20-foot heritage wall exhibiting the history of the Navy in Central Florida. The group is raising funds now and hopes to construct and dedicate the memorial by early next year.

Students of associate professor Rosalind Beiler, director of public history, and military history assistant professor Barbara Gannon earlier this year researched the project and presented the findings to the council, which had asked for help in creating the heritage wall.

Mark Barnes, a graduate student who also made a presentation about the research at an intern showcase this summer at UCF’s Public History Center in Sanford, said he was honored to be part of the project that will recognize those who trained at the base and went on to serve our country. This would be the ninth Lone Sailor Memorial Park in the nation, he said.

“This will be a physical exhibit that I can go to and say that I did something that was a big part of this,” Barnes said.

The UCF part of the project is still in progress. The oral histories are being contributed to the UCF Community Veterans History Project and, as appropriate, to the Library of Congress’ Veterans History Project. Permissions are being sought to use images, and the photos are being uploaded to the UCF online RICHES Mosaic Interface.

“My students learned a great deal in the process of working with community partners on a ‘real-world’ project,” said Beiler. “And the committee seemed quite pleased with the outcome.”

The memorial will serve as a reminder of the Navy’s legacy in Orlando, and an inspiration to those currently serving and who will serve in the Navy.

“We could not have been more impressed with UCF’s dedication on this,” said Andy Mohler, co-chair of the Lone Sailor Navy Memorial Committee. “So much talent and passion. That’s what really came out.

“This will forever embody the history of the Navy in Orlando. It’s not just an academic exercise that will gather dust on a shelf.”