'Over There' - a new five session course in Semester II, 2017

​The anniversary of the first year of First World I, particularly the landing at Gallipoli, was remembered through many anniversary activities.  As John Barry’s column for the Cooee projects in the Benalla Ensign so tellingly reminds us every week, the war continued on for a further four years.  We are now encountering anniversary milestones of the final 18 months of the war.  For a number of us, relatives were still fighting, some killed or injured.  John Barry has taught classes for U3A previously and it seemed that a course which would be both timely and a further outcome of the work he is doing each week for the Ensign would be worth offering at U3A.  When approached, John expressed interest in developing such a course. 

‘Over there’ will provide description and analysis of 100th anniversary milestones in the First World War over the months from July 1917 to the end of the war November 1918 and its aftermath.  Content will include, for example,  ‘How WWI began’; ‘The aims of the parties – what were they trying to do?’; ‘Changing Technology during the course of the war’; ‘Blockades, Famine and Terrror’; ‘What happened at the end?’  and ‘How did  WW1 effectively come to be an 80 year war?’ Participants will be able to track and make links to the experience of relatives and the Benalla community in relation to the war at that time.  The class will incorporate documentaries, video segments and lots of opportunities to ask questions!