Their Vietnam: Voices of Azalea Trace - A Documentary Premiere

About this event

One year after UWF students began recording the firsthand experiences of veterans at Pensacola’s Azalea Trace retirement community, those stories are coming to the screen.

The UWF Department of History and Philosophy will premiere Their Vietnam: Voices of Azalea Trace, a documentary created from a year-long Public History oral history project, on Tuesday, November 10, at the UWF Center for Fine and Performing Arts Mainstage Theatre. A public reception begins at 6:30 p.m., followed by the documentary premiere at 7 p.m.

The approximately 1-hour, 40-minute film centers on the individual experiences of Vietnam veterans at Azalea Trace. Rather than attempting to present a single narrative of the war, the documentary preserves the veterans’ own accounts of service, identity, and the sobering realities of war.

Registration is not required, but is preferred.

About the Project: The documentary grew from a broader oral history initiative launched by the UWF Department of History and Philosophy in Fall 2025 in partnership with Azalea Trace. The project had two central goals: to record and preserve the remarkable firsthand histories of local veterans for future generations and to provide UWF students with hands-on training in oral history, interviewing, transcription, and other professional skills used in public history.

Under the guidance of UWF faculty Joyce Southard and Nathan Smith, undergraduate and graduate students participated in interviews with Azalea Trace veterans. The students gained practical experience conducting and documenting oral histories while helping preserve personal accounts that might otherwise be lost.

Among those interviewed during the broader project were veterans with distinguished military and public-service careers, as well as veterans and spouses whose experiences illuminate the deeply personal dimensions of military service and war.

The resulting oral histories are intended to preserve these firsthand accounts in UWF’s archives. The project has also explored additional ways of sharing the histories with the public, including documentary film and publication.