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Pritzker Military Library offers oral histories, speakers

The wide windows in the landmark Monroe Building offer a sweeping view of Michigan Avenue and Millennium Park. On a crystal-blue spring day, it's easy to temporarily forget the long, bloody history of warfare. But keeping the stories of "citizen soldiers" around the globe alive for future generations is central to the Pritzker Military Library's mission. The organization provides a combination of wide-ranging programming, exhibits and archival materials to achieve that goal.

The library, dedicated on Oct. 23, 2003, moved from its first home in Streeterville to its current prime location just after the great blizzard of February 2011. Founder James N. Pritzker (who goes by "J.N."), himself a much-decorated retired lieutenant colonel in the Army and colonel in the Illinois Army National Guard, began the library with his prominent family's collection of books and artifacts on military subjects. It has grown to include more than 44,000 volumes, says President and CEO Kenneth Clarke. In addition to military history, the library includes special collections on diverse topics such as Soviet history (with many books written in Russian and German) and military medical history.

On a recent tour, reference coordinator Paul Grasmehr noted that, while there are military libraries at various bases around the country, their accessibility to the public in a post-9/11 world of heightened security is limited. And few of them have the extensive holdings boasted by the Pritzker collection.

For example, Grasmehr says he recently handled a request for an interlibrary loan from the National Library of the Czech Republic for a rare book about the air campaign at Stalingrad during World War II. The Pritzker and a library in Denmark have the only known circulating copies. Though the Pritzker collection was initially heavy on books about the U.S. Civil War and World War II, Grasmehr emphasizes that the library contains many volumes across the span of human history and nations.

Chief librarian Theresa Embrey notes that the library's oldest book, a history of the Low Country wars, dates from 1650. Since the Pritzker's mission is nonpartisan (all its funding is from private, nongovernmental sources), the holdings in the rare book room also include a first edition of Joseph Heller's anti-war classic "Catch-22," with a signed letter from Heller enclosed.

In addition to a popular speaker series (including an appearance at 6 p.m. Thursday by Robert Edsel, author of "Saving Italy: The Race to Rescue a Nation's Treasures From the Nazis"), Pritzker has a website offering a wide range of archived podcasts. The library has also partnered with WTTW and WYCC public television stations with the "Citizen Soldier" series, taped and simulcast online in the library's intimate 110-seat auditorium.

Clarke points out that a recent show about Holocaust liberators featured a panel discussing the story of Maj. Gen. William P. Levine, of Highland Park, one of the highest-ranking Jewish officers in World War II and one of the first liberators to enter Dachau. The program was made even more emotional by the fact that Levine, who was not well enough to be at the taping, passed away the day after the program taped.

"We were able to dedicate it to him," says Clarke. Levine's uniform is on display in the permanent exhibition on citizen soldiers, as are journals, photos and letters from soldiers of many different conflicts.

The other permanent exhibit, "The Medal of Honor," features an interactive display with the citations of the 3,477 recipients of the highest honor granted by the U.S. military, from Pvt. Jacob Parrott's exploits in the Civil War's "Great Locomotive Chase" to those recognized for service in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The library also maintains a small studio, dedicated to Tuskegee Airman Coleman Thompson Holt, for recording oral histories that are then made available through the website.

"The World War II generation tends to be very self-effacing," Grasmehr says. "They often say things like, 'I didn't do anything different from anybody else who was there.'"

He points out that the staff works closely with those veterans participating in the oral history project "to create questions specific to their experiences," some of which are, of course, quite disturbing to recall and require sensitivity.

But Grasmehr also points to two journals in the "Citizen Soldier" exhibit: one from a New Hampshire militiaman in 1777, the other from a soldier in Anzio, Italy, during World War II. "Almost 170 years apart, but they have the same complaints about food and supplies," he says.

The current temporary exhibitions include "She's a WOW: Women's Service Organizations in World War II" and a collection of propaganda posters from World War I. The latter features such iconic images as Uncle Sam, the Doughboy, the Spirit of Columbia and Chandler Christy's famous "Christy Girl" in a sailor's suit, declaring "Gee, I Wish I Were a Man. I'd Join the Navy."

The library is open to accepting donations of archival materials from veterans and their families, but more than the objects, the Pritzker's physical and virtual home remains dedicated to opening a wide window on the soldier's life.

Says Clarke: "Somebody comes to the library and says, 'I have a Purple Heart and I don't know who it belongs to.' While that has value to us as an artifact, it has more value when there is a story of a real person connected to it."

ctc-arts@tribune.com

Pritzker Military Library
When:
Open 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesday to Thursday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday
Where: 104 S. Michigan Ave.
Tickets: Admission $5 for nonmembers (free with active military ID); contact 312-374-9333 and pritzkermilitarylibrary.org

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