Vietnam Center and Sam Johnson Vietnam Archive

News and Updates

Author: Justin Saffell

  • 2011 Guest Lecture Series Celebrates Nurses Week with LeAnn Thieman

    LeAnn ThiemanThe Vietnam Center and Archive is proud to present the third speaker in our 2011 Guest Lecture Series, Mrs. LeAnn Thieman.  In April 1975, during the closing days of the Vietnam War, US and international organizations, with the support of the US government, undertook a daring mission to evacuate Vietnamese infants and children, many of them orphans, out of the country. This mission was codenamed Operation Babylift. LeAnn Thieman, working as a volunteer for Friends of Children of Vietnam, was one of the nurses who became involved in the operation. Originally agreeing to escort six babies out of Vietnam, including her newly adopted son, upon her arrival in Saigon LeAnn heard the news that President Gerald Ford had approved Operation Babylift and that she would instead be helping 300 children leave South Vietnam.

    LeAnn Thieman has been a nurse for over 30 years, and her experiences with Operation Babylift have significantly impacted on her life. Since the war, LeAnn has become a celebrated presenter, earning the Certified Speaking Professional designation. In 2008, LeAnn was inducted into the Speaker Hall of Fame. Additionally, she has authored or co-authored eleven books in the Chicken Soup series, as well as three other books and a bimonthly E-zine called “Sip of Soup.”  Her book This Must Be My Brother recounts her experiences during Operation Babylift, while Adrift in the Storms: A Twenty Year Journey to Peace is the true story of one of the children she helped rescue. She has appeared on countless radio and television programs and in numerous print publications. Talks are currently underway to produce her story as a feature film.

    The location of the lecture has been changed from the previously announced location to the Lanier Auditorium of the Texas Tech School of Law, and will be held on Thursday, May 12th at 7:00pm.  Admission is free and open to the public.  LeAnn will be available for a book signing immediately following the lecture, and copies of her books will be available for purchase.

    An invitation-only reception with LeAnn for the Friends of the Vietnam Center will be held from 6:00-6:45pm in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library on the day of the lecture.

    The mission of the Vietnam Center and Archive Guest Lecture Series is to enrich the intellectual and cultural life of students, faculty, and the community at large by bringing distinguished individuals to campus for presentations on specific aspects of the Vietnam War, its lasting impact on American politics, society and culture, and on contemporary issues in Southeast Asia.

    This lecture series is funded in part by a generous grant from the Helen Jones Foundation.  For more information on the 2011 VNCA Guest Lecture Series see http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/GLS.

  • Dr. Reckner Receives Lifetime Achievement Award

    Texas Tech University’s President Guy Bailey presented a special Lifetime Achievement Award to Vietnam Center founder Dr. James Reckner during the annual Global Vision Award ceremony to recognize the individual or office especially active in promoting campus internationalization during the previous year.  TTU’s Office of International Affairs hosted the award ceremony at the International Cultural Center, and this year’s event was held on April 21.

    The Office of International Affairs selected Dr. Reckner because of his pioneering contributions to establishing the Vietnam Center and his dedication to the institution over many years.  Thanks to his efforts, and the dedicated staff he assembled, the Vietnam Center and Archives now hold one of the major collections of related documents in the world, and the Center organizes and hosts major events related to the Vietnam era. Dr. Reckner has also worked tirelessly to create a number of partnerships between Vietnamese institutions and TTU.  In addition, he has led initiatives to assist Vietnamese institutes of higher learning in a number of ways, such as establishing scholarships to allow Vietnamese students to attend university in their home country.

    The annual Global Vision Award, first given in 2003, was created to recognize a faculty member, administrator or organization whose contributions inspired students to study and experience cultures abroad, as well as encourage a broader understanding of the world.  It has since expanded to recognize a broader achievement in promoting campus internationalization.

    See more images from the award ceremony on our Facebook page

  • Reminder: Kim Phuc Free Lecture This Thursday

    Kim Phuc, “the girl in the picture,” will speak this week as part of our 2011 Guest Lecture Series. Kim’s lecture will be held on Thursday, April 14th at 7:00pm in the Allen Theatre of the Texas Tech Student Union Building. Admission is free and open to the public.  The lecture will be followed by an invitation-only reception with Mrs. Phuc for the Friends of the Vietnam Center in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library.

    The mission of the Vietnam Center and Archive Guest Lecture Series is to enrich the intellectual and cultural life of students, faculty, and the community at large by bringing distinguished individuals to campus for presentations on specific aspects of the Vietnam War, its lasting impact on American politics, society and culture, and on contemporary issues in Southeast Asia.

    This lecture series is funded in part by a generous grant from the Helen Jones Foundation.  For more information on the 2011 VNCA Guest Lecture Series or about Kim Phuc see http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/GLS.

  • Reminder: APAHM Film Festival Starts This Week

    The Vietnam Center and Archive’s 3rd Annual Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Film Festival starts this week with Green Dragon on Wednesday at 3:00pm and Rashomon at 7:00pm.  The festival continues on Thursday with Rashomon at 3:00pm, and The Toll of the Sea at 7:00pm.

    Next week’s showings include Kim’s Story at 3:00pm on Tuesday, followed by Green Dragon at 7:00pm, and on Wednesday The Toll of the Sea at 3:00pm, and Kim’s Story at 7:00pm.  All showings will be in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library, and admission is free and open to the public.

    For more information about the festival and all of the films see http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/2011filmfestival.

    Kim Phuc, the subject of the film Kim’s Story, will be speaking as part of our Guest Lecture Series on Thursday, April 14th at 7:00pm in the Allen Theatre of the Texas Tech Student Union.

    We hope to see you at one or more of these events!

  • 3rd Annual APAHM Festival

    The Vietnam Center and Archive and the Texas Tech University Libraries present the 3rd Annual Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Film Festival from April 6th-13th.  This year’s festival features four films: Green Dragon; Rashomon; The Toll of the Sea; and Kim’s Story: The Road from Vietnam.  Each film will be shown twice at different dates and times, and all showings will be held in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library.  Admission is free and open to the public.

    Green Dragon tells the story of a group of Vietnamese refugees in 1975 at Camp Pendleton, and the Marines assigned to protect them as they await sponsorship in the United States.   Wed. 4/6 3:15pm; Tues. 4/12 7:00pm.

    Rashomon is a classic Japanese crime mystery that depicts the rape of a woman and the murder of her samurai husband through the very different perspectives and accounts of four witnesses: the rape victim, the rape victim’s murdered husband speaking through a medium, the bandit/rapist, and the narrator. Wed. 4/6 7:00pm; Thurs. 4/7 3:15pm.

    The Toll of the Sea is the tragic love story of a Hong Kong girl who saves a drowning American man and falls in love with him. Show Times: Thurs. 4/7 7:00pm; Wed. 4/13 3:15pm.

    Kim’s Story: The Road from Vietnam is a documentary film based on the inspirational life story of Phan Thi Kim Phuc, “the girl in the photo” who was severely burned in a Napalm attack on her village of Trang Bang, South Vietnam in 1972.  Show Times: Tues. 4/12, 3:15pm; Wed. 4/13 7:00pm.

    Kim Phuc, the subject of Kim’s Story, will be speaking as part of the VNCA’s 2011 Guest Lecture Series on Thursday, 14th of April at 7:00pm in the Allen Theatre of the TTU Student Union Building.

    For more information on the film festival or each of the films, including a complete list of show times, see http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/2011filmfestival.

    See also: 2011 APAHM Film Festival Poster

  • 2011 Guest Lecture Series Presents Kim Phuc, “the Girl in the Photo”

    The Vietnam Center and Archive is proud to present the second speaker in our 2011 Guest Lecture Series, Mrs. Kim Phuc.  In 1972 Kim was photographed running down a road naked and on fire after a napalm strike on her village.  That Pulitzer Prize winning photo by AP photographer Nick Ut not only greatly influenced the American public’s opinion of the war, it became the North Vietnamese symbol of the war in much of their propaganda.  Kim became known as “the girl in the photo.”  Now Kim runs a non-profit organization dedicated to healing children in war-torn areas around the world.  She is also a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for Peace and travels the world telling her story of recovery, forgiveness and courage.

    The lecture will be held on Thursday, April 14th at 7:00pm in the Allen Theatre of the Texas Tech Student Union Building. Admission is free and open to the public.  The lecture will be followed by an invitation-only reception with Mrs. Phuc for the Friends of the Vietnam Center in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library.

    The mission of the Vietnam Center and Archive Guest Lecture Series is to enrich the intellectual and cultural life of students, faculty, and the community at large by bringing distinguished individuals to campus for presentations on specific aspects of the Vietnam War, its lasting impact on American politics, society and culture, and on contemporary issues in Southeast Asia.

    This lecture series is funded in part by a generous grant from the Helen Jones Foundation.  For more information on the 2011 VNCA Guest Lecture Series see http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/GLS.

  • Searchable PDFs

    Over the past nine months the staff of the Vietnam Archive have undertaken a project to convert all of the digitized document PDFs in the Virtual Vietnam Archive into a searchable format. This project is now complete.  Over 275,000 files were re-processed in the course of this project.

    When the Virtual Archive was started in 2001 the majority of Internet users were on dial-up connections, so in order to keep file sizes as small as possible, the decision was made to not save digitized documents as searchable PDFs.  OCR (Optical Character Recognition) was performed on the documents, and the text that was generated was added to the database for searching, but the PDF was not saved with that text embedded in it.  Now, with more users having access to high-speed connections, and with the availability of better compression technology for PDFs, we have gone back and embedded the OCR into these documents, allowing users to search for words within the PDF.  To search for a word or phrase in a PDF, open the file and hit ctrl+F on your keyboard.  Please note that the quality of the document affects the quality of the OCR text.  If the digital image of the document is very scratchy or grainy, the OCR may not have been able to pick out as many words as it would with a higher quality document.  The CDEC collection is a good example of this.  The quality of the microfilm that was digitized was not very good, and we were therefore unable to run successful OCR on that collection.  Additionally, hand-written documents will not be searchable.

    Some users may be required to update to newer versions of their PDF readers.  Versions of Adobe Reader older than Version 6 will not be able to access the modified PDFs or PDFs newly added to the Virtual Archive.  Adobe Reader can be downloaded free from the Adobe website – http://get.adobe.com/reader/?promoid=BUIGO

  • Latest Issue of the Friends of the Vietnam Center Newsletter available online

    Cover page of the Winter 2011 Issue of the Friends of the Vietnam Center NewsletterThe Winter 2011 issue of the Friends of the Vietnam Center Newsletter is now available online.  This issue include articles on two upcoming events: the 7th Triennial Vietnam Symposium; and the first lecture in the 2011 Guest Lecture Series– Adrian Cronauer.

    If you would like to receive a full color printed version of this newsletter in your mailbox, please consider becoming a friend of the Vietnam Center.  Membership information can be found on our Firends of the Vietnam Center webpage.

    Links:

    Newsletters: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/friends/newsletters.php

    Membership Information: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/friends/

  • Reminder: The 7th Triennial Vietnam Symposium

    The 7th Triennial Vietnam Symposium is just two weeks away, but there is still time to register.

    The symposium will be held at the Overton Hotel and Conference Center in Lubbock on March 10-12th.  This year’s symposium includes presentations on a wide variety of topics, with presenters from around the United States, Australia, Scotland, China, Vietnam, and Germany.  The complete agenda, hotel information, and an online registration form are available on the symposium website: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/symposium.htm

    We hope to see you there!

  • Upcoming Vietnam Center and Archive Events

    Adrian Cronauer will be the first speaker in the 2011 VNCA Guest Lecture Series on March 10th at 7:00pm

    The Vietnam Center and Archive has a full schedule of events coming up over the next few months:

    March 10-12, 8:00am-5:00pm: 7th Triennial Vietnam Symposium at the Overton Hotel and Conference Center [symposium information, agenda, and registration: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/symposium.htm]

    March 10, 7:00pm: 2011 Guest Lecture Series presents Adrian Cronauer at the Lanier Auditorium of the TTU Law School [more information: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/GLS].  The lecture will be preceded by a special invitation-only reception with Mr. Cronauer for Friends of the Vietnam Center.

    April 6-13: 3rd Annual Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Film Festival (4 films: Green Dragon, Rashomon, The Toll of the Sea, and Kim’s Story).  All films at the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library [more information and film show times: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/2011filmfestival]

    April 14, 7:00pm: 2011 Guest Lecture Series presents Kim Phuc at the Allen Theatre of the TTU Student Union Building [more information: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/GLS]

    May 12, 7:00pm: 2011 Guest Lecture Series presents LeAnn Thieman at the Allen Theatre of the TTU Student Union Building [more information: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/GLS]

    We will post more information about each of these events as the dates get closer.