Regular Spring 2023 Dinner Meetings Have Been Cancelled
A spring meeting for 2023 will be held at 6 P.M., April 14 at Drumond Chapel of the Suncrest United Methodist Church.
This meeting will replace the normal spring dinner programs, and is being held as COVID cases recede. It is hoped that the dinners can be restarted in fall, 2023.
The April 14 meeting will provide complimentary coffee and desserts. See the announcement to the right for program information.
Reservations are required, and may be made by calling Janet DeVault at 304-276-1109. Please do not call after 9 PM. Reservations should be made by April 10. Attendance will be limited to 49 persons, the room capacity.
Dinner Programs are Being Reorganized; The Following Lists Past Arrangements:
The Society has held four dinner meetings each year on the third Fridays of March, May, September, and November where a program of historical interest is included.
The public and guests are welcome; bring a friend or colleague. Those wishing to join the Society may do so at or after the meeting. Persons wishing to only attend the free program that follows the dinner are welcome.
Jack Hammersmith to Speak at April 14, 2023 Meeting about WVU Professor James Morton Callahan
The Society will hold a coffee-social meeting with retired WVU Professor Jack Hammersmith as the speaker. Jack will provide information on James Morton Callahan, a historian of local prominence and national importance during his long career at WVU. A native of Indiana, Callahan taught as a young man in the public schools of that state but eventually earned degrees from the Universities of Indiana and Chicago before a doctorate at Johns Hopkins. When Callahan joined WVU in 1902, he was a well-published author with four books already in print. Best known initially as an expert in US diplomacy, he eventually pioneered in state and local studies. Between 1902 and 1929, he served as chair of history and political science, and, beginning in 1916, also as dean of the college of arts and sciences. In both positions he worked diligently for the upgrading of the institution’s faculty, departments, and programs. Married to one of his first students and the father of three, he died in 1956 at the age of 91.
About the speaker
Jack Hammersmith grew up in small-town northern Ohio, and received his college degrees from Northwestern University and the Universities of California and Virginia. Joining the WVU History Department in 1968, he taught classes in US and East Asian (Chinese and Japanese) histories for forty-eight years. He also taught as a Fulbright Scholar in Japan during one of his residences there. He retired in 2016. Since that time, he has continued teaching a variety of OLLI classes with American and Asian themes. He is an engaging speaker and brings to life various details to humanize history.