July 11, 6:30 p.m.
Bridging the Civilian and Military Divide
Doug Bradley & Leanne Knobloch
Octagon Barn

Leanne and Doug will share stories and research to honor those who have served and to educate civilians about the challenges facing veterans and how to help. Dessert reception and time to learn more about available resources for veterans will follow the lecture.

Leanne K. Knobloch is a professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her research examines how military families communicate across the cycle of deployment and reunion. Her scholarship has been honored by the Golden Anniversary Monograph Award from the National Communication Association, the Biennial Article Award from the International Association for Relationship Research, and the John Garrison Award from the International Communication Association. In 2015, she was named a University Scholar, which is the highest recognition of faculty excellence bestowed by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. 

She serves as a Science Advisory Board Member of the Military Child Education Coalition and a research consultant for REBOOT Combat Recovery, which offers combat trauma healing courses to military personnel and their families. Her research on military families navigating deployment has been funded by the U.S. Department of Defense.

Doug Bradley has written extensively about his Vietnam, and post-Vietnam, experiences. His latest book, Who’ll Stop the Rain: Respect, Remembrance, and Reconciliation in Post-Vietnam America, has been described by noted historian H. Bruce Franklin as “a brave and invaluable attempt to bring us back together…a potent medicine for a sick nation.”

After graduation from college, Doug was drafted in March 1970. He served as a combat correspondent for the U. S. Army Republic of Vietnam headquarters at Long Binh, South Vietnam, from November 1970-November 1971. He relocated to Madison, Wisconsin, in 1974 where he helped establish Vets House, a storefront, community-based service center for Vietnam era veterans.

A founding member of the Deadly Writers Patrol, Doug is the author of DEROS Vietnam: Dispatches from the Air-Conditioned Jungle and co-author, with Craig Werner, of We Gotta Get Out of This Place: The Soundtrack of the Vietnam War which was named best music book of 2015 by Rolling Stone magazine.

July 27, 6:30 p.m.
Book Discussion: Learning to Stay
Erin Celello
Zoom & Arcadia Books

Join us for a community read and discussion of the book Learning to Stay by Erin Celello. Free (though donations are appreciated!) copies of the book are available at libraries in Clyde, Lone Rock, Plain, and Spring Green. We'll have a discussion with the author on July 27th from 6:30-7:30 p.m. via Zoom. Arcadia Books will be a host site for the Zoom discussion if you don't want to do Zoom yourself.

Learning to Stay tells the story of the military experience from the perspective of a wife whose husband returns from Iraq with a traumatic brain injury that has turned him from a thoughtful, brilliant, and patient man into someone quite different. The book is about their journey of healing and resilience in the face of a new, unexpected life path.

Erin Celello is the author of Miracle Beach and Learning to Stay. She was born and raised in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where she also earned an MFA in fiction from Northern Michigan University. She lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with her husband, two sons, and two unruly Vizslas. She teaches writing at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

October 14-16
Writing Their Way Back Home: A writing workshop for veterans
Bethel Horizons Retreat Center, Dodgeville, WI

Our veterans, and their family members, need to tell their stories, and we civilians need to appreciate and understand them. The first step is communicating the experience, be it via story, novel, memoir, or poetry.  “You don't honor someone by telling them, ‘I can never imagine what you've been through,’” says former Marine and Iraq war veteran Phil Klay. “Instead, listen to their story and try to imagine being in it, no matter how hard or uncomfortable that feels....”

Writing Their Way Back Home is a way to begin that process. This free (to veterans and their family members) writing workshop is intended to provide participants space and time to write about their wartime experiences in order to heal, be heard, and create meaningful expression. The workshop will be led by Vietnam veteran Doug Bradley, author of three books grounded in the Vietnam experience; Erin Celello whose novel Learning to Stay focused on the reintegration of a soldier into society and was based on extensive research on veterans living with brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder; and Vietnam veteran Bruce Meredith, until recently lead editor for the Deadly Writers Patrol magazine whose mission was “to encourage greater understanding of war’s effect on individuals and the nation.”

The workshop is limited to 20 attendees and will take place on Friday-Saturday, October 14-15 at the Bethel Horizons Retreat Center in Dodgeville. Housing, meals, and other workshop expenses will be provided free of charge to participants.

If you or a veteran you know may be interested, contact Stef at stef@rivervalleycommons.org no later than Friday, September 16. The workshop’s aim, according to Doug Bradley, “is to begin the powerful process for veterans to write their stories and reflect on events they experienced in war in a way that may lead to greater insight, creativity, and healing.”