CALS Collecting Stories for Vietnam War Project

The Central Arkansas Library System (CALS) is celebrating Tim O’Brien’s classic The Things They Carried, a collection of short stories centered on the Vietnam War, as part of the National Endowment for the Arts’ Big Read program and is seeking to record oral histories with Arkansas Vietnam War veterans for a project of the CALS Butler Center for Arkansas Studies.

More than 58,000 Americans were killed during the Vietnam War, including 592 Arkansans. The CALS Butler Center for Arkansas Studies launched the Arkansas Vietnam War Project to record oral histories, allowing veterans, family members, and civilians to voice their recollections of the war. The project also collects letters, photographs, and diaries from Arkansans who served during the conflict, from family members of veterans, and from civilians who want to share memories of the war. Arkansas Vietnam War Project information may be found at robertslibrary.org/arkansas-vietnam-war-project.

Anyone interested in participating in an oral history interview can contact Brian Robertson at brianr@cals.org or (501) 320-5723.

This project is part of NEA Big Read: CALS. NEA Big Read is a program of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest. To learn more about NEA Big Read: CALS, contact mchrist@cals.org or (501) 918-3069.