Getting a PhD

I’ve decided to get my PhD in history. It’s been a dream of mine for many years, and now with over a decade of experience under my belt working at one of the premier research libraries in the world, I’m ready to focus on my own research. I’ll be working on my doctorate through the Historical Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences. I intend to finish writing my dissertation in roughly two years. Though this is an ambitious goal, with patience, perseverance and hard work, I know I can achieve it. The many years working in the Hoover Institution Library and Archives at Stanford have familiarized me with the amazing story of Herbert Hoover. Unfortunately, Hoover is most commonly associated with the Great Depression which doomed his presidency. I think time will show that the story is a bit more complex and Hoover will get the proper credit he deserves for his many achievements both in public and private life. Hoover built his reputation during World War I as a peerless humanitarian who coordinated the relief of millions of Belgians who faced starvation during the German occupation and the British naval blockade. After the war, Hoover organized relief for tens of millions of Europeans across more than twenty countries as head of the American Relief Administration (A.R.A.). It’s one aspect of this endeavor that I’ve chosen to focus on for my dissertation. Herbert Hoover had a special relationship with Poland, stretching back to his undergraduate days at Stanford when he met and befriended Poland’s future prime minister and renowned concert pianist, Jan Paderewski. Hoover accompanied President Wilson to the Versailles Conference where the 13th of Wilson’s famous “Fourteen Points” declared: “An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant.” Hoover visited Poland in August, 1919 and was received with great fanfare and praise for the critical relief supplies that the A.R.A. had begun to provide. Hoover’s motives for assisting the wartorn regions of Europe, particularly Poland, were more than humanitarian in nature. Hoover recognized the destabilizing potential of Bolshevik Russia and saw the newly independent states, Poland chief among them, as the bulwark against a Communist push to the west. A year after Hoover’s visit to Poland, the Poles thwarted the main offensive of the Red Army at the Battle of Warsaw, also known as the “Miracle at the Vistula”, Poland’s longest and most important river. The significance of the A.R.A.’s efforts in strengthening Poland’s ability to defend itself through material aid and the rebuilding of infrastructure, will be one of my areas of study.

I know that writing a dissertation is an immense undertaking, I’m essentially writing a book. It’ll be a rewarding experience, and I’m sure that the people I meet and the things I learn along this path will change me in ways I can’t anticipate. I know that simply earning my PhD won’t automatically make me a historian, any more than turning 18 made me an adult and a man. Becoming a historian is a lifelong process and never a stationary target. I’m humbled to have this opportunity and blessed to be able to study the history of my ancestral homeland as it relates to the history of the land of my birth, in one of the great shining examples of the best impulses of American generosity. Publicly declaring a goal is the first big step towards realizing its completion. Though it’s one small step for this man, it’ll be one giant leap towards a better understanding of the past.