A National History Day documentary by Jethro Abatayo and Logan Gibert
Pleasant Valley Middle School, Vancouver, WA

Editor’s Note: Established in 1974, National History Day (NHD) is an award winning, non-profit education organization offering year-long academic programs that engage over 600,000 middle and high school students around the world annually in conducting original research on historical topics. These research-based projects are entered into contests at the local and affiliate levels in all fifty states where the top student projects have the opportunity to advance to the national competition or finals at the University of Maryland in College Park. Through this program NHD also seeks to improve the quality of history education by providing professional development opportunities and curriculum materials for educators. Slightly more than 3,000 of these students advanced to the final round of the 2014 competition in College Park, MD in June.

Among the many prizes and awards presented in College Park is the Captain Kenneth Coskey Naval History Prize.   The prize is named for the late Captain Ken Coskey, a Vietnam War combat aviator and Prisoner of War, and former Executive Director of the Naval Historical Foundation. Rosemary Coskey, wife of Captain Coskey, and Captain Charles Chadbourn, USN (Ret.) presented the award on behalf of the Foundation as well as generous $1,000 cash prizes to the junior and senior division winners. This is the first year that the awards were given to both high school and middle school representatives for the best naval history projects. Captain Coskey was an avid, long time supporter of National History Day up until his death last year.

(Return to the July 2014 Issue Table of Contents)