New School, New Century: The Gettysburg Semester

On Wednesday morning, I moved into the Appleford Inn in Gettysburg, PA, once a bed & breakfast constructed in the latter half of the nineteenth century. For the next four months or so, it will be my home as I participate in The Gettysburg Semester, an obviously semester-long program offered by Gettysburg College's Civil War Era Studies Department for students from outside schools.

Here in this almost overwhelmingly and intensely inspiring environment, I hope to reach a climax in my studies as a student artist and (slowly-becoming) historian by reaching as complete an integration of Civil War history into my art forms as possible.

Even after only two days, my Facebook status-hosted "Gettysburg College Updates" have hinted at the numbers of anecdotal, yet powerfully influential, experiences in this new realm where the middle of the nineteenth century is still present, and I hope to describe them in more detail here in future posts! (But for now, here is a preview!)

All four Gettysburg Semester students in front of the Appleford.

My favorite pocket sketchbook page so far: a rough contour line of part of the battlefield landscape from atop the Pennsylvania Monument (below, across both pages), notes from tours and to self (left and right in spaces), and a quick gesture of the female figure sculpture's portrait atop the PA monument from which I observed the field (right).

For more information on the Gettysburg Semester, visit our Facebook page or Civil War Era Studies at Gettysburg College!