‘Teacher, Mentor, Colleague and Friend’: Professor Peter Carmichael Remembered at Celebration of Life
Cameron Sauers ’21 speaking at Peter Carmichael’s Celebration of Life at Majestic Theater, Friday, Sept. 20. (William Oehler/The Gettysburgian)
By Vincent DiFonzo, Editor-in-Chief
Friends, colleagues and students gathered at Majestic Theater for a celebration of the late Professor Peter Carmichael’s life on Friday, Sept. 22. Carmichael died on July 21, 2024 due to complications from a respiratory illness.
Carmichael served as director of the Civil War Institute for 14 years in addition to his role as a history professor. Shortly after his death, the Gettysburgian collected and published tributes from former students of Carmichael.
The event was organized by the history department and CWI with support from the offices of the President, Provost and College Advancement. History department chair Dina Lowy opened the event, thanking the organizers of the event and welcoming Carmichael’s family.
“My organizing partners include Jill Titus, Ashley Lusky, Triada Chavis and Kari Greenwalt. In consultation with Pete’s amazing wife, Beth, we extend a warm welcome to Beth, their girls, Cameron and Isabelle, Pete’s mom, Charlotte, and Beth’s parents, Janet and Jack. We hope the admiration and affection filling this space wraps you in a warm embrace together,” said Lowy. “Feel free to laugh, cry, hug your neighbor. We hope you get the comfort you need as we remember and celebrate the life of this wonderful teacher, mentor, colleague and friend.”
History professor Michael Birkner spoke first. He began by discussing his first interactions with Carmichael as he served on the search committee that hired him in 2010. During Carmichael’s interviews for the role at Gettysburg College, Birkner explained that Carmichael expressed ambition to make CWI “become the go-to place for the latest conversation in Civil War studies nationally.”
Birkner said that Carmichael went above and beyond in achieving his ambitious goals over his 14-year tenure.
“He wanted the CWI summer program to become more participatory. He wanted to expand opportunities for Gettysburg College history students to serve as interns at state and national park sites. He wanted to bring in professional staff of the first class. He wanted to broaden the scope of a history education at Gettysburg College to include public history for those interested in that track. He wanted to mentor academically talented and ambitious students and to find places that fit their interests for grad school, whether in public or academic history, it’s quite a laundry list. And you know what Pete accomplished? All of this and more,” said Birkner.
Carmichael acted as a “perpetual motion machine,” according to Birkner, “attending conferences, speaking in Civil War, roundtables, pursuing donors for the college, giving tours in the battlefield, so many tours, working with his colleagues at the CWI to find just the right people to fill the slots in the CWI angle conference events thus enhance the conference.”
Carmichael became well-known on campus for his scarves, which he often wore. “You can call it an affectation, if you wish, but it was also unmistakably integral to Pete’s flair to wear that scarf, or, as the French might say, it was his frission,” said Birkner.
“If I were pressed to come up with a single mental image of Pete Carmichael, it would be of him standing at the entry to my office, having concluded a quick but meaty conversation, heading out to his next activity, throwing his arm, getting his scarf and just the right angle as he would leave and move on to the next thing,” Birkner shared.
Birkner praised Carmichael’s work in the classroom, saying that Carmichael dedicated himself to helping all of his students in every way possible, especially those who were struggling in his class.
“It’s worth noting that Pete made time, not just for the A students, but for those who were struggling. I received more than one email in recent weeks from students who have affirmed this quality of Pete, which represents, to me, the best of what we aspire to,” said Birkner.
Professor Michael Birkner speaking at Peter Carmichael’s Celebration of Life at Majestic Theater, Friday, Sept. 20. (William Oehler/The Gettysburgian)
Birkner shared an example of “about how Pete behaved and why Pete was so distinctive and so important as a human being.” This involved appearances of Carmichael as a frequent guest on the Civil War history podcast “Addressing Gettysburg.”
Regarding one particular appearance of Carmichael on the podcast back in 2017, Birkner said, “Pete was on fire in his repartee, rolling with every riff, matching examples and witticisms with his host and others on the podcast. But here’s what stood out amidst all the joshing that preceded the promotion of the CWI, [podcast host Matt Callery] said to the audience of the podcast that Pete had transformed the way he looked at the Civil War.”
He also joked about how “Pete periodically got down in the dumps about certain personalities on our campus and frustrations with the college’s administration. We are being honest here. He could be whining. He could be self pitying, he could be fierce in his expostulations.”
Further, he joked, “I also need to add context that almost every faculty member at Gettysburg College is whiny about something or other at some point, it’s just that he excelled in this realm.”
Birkner, who has taught at Gettysburg since 1989, characterized Carmichael as possibly the most dedicated and determined colleague he has ever worked with here.
“I don’t know anybody at Gettysburg College who gave more of himself to this place to make Gettysburg College the best college it could possibly be. The only person in even in his ballpark, would be my dear friend, [history professor] Bill Bowman,” said Birkner.
Birkner concluded his remarks, “Pete was a comet racing across our sky. From my perspective, I can only say to Pete as he’s still racing, you rocked. Pete, we miss you every day.”
Next, Lowy introduced Cameron Sauers ’21, who said, “You did not just take a class with Pete Carmichael. You attended what I would call the Pete Carmichael experience, perhaps the extravaganza.”
Sauers described the unique Carmichael classroom experience.
“We learned history, don’t worry. But there was also the spur of the moment, things that you never knew, what would come out of his mouth when he sauntered into the classroom. There were musical interludes, recaps of his recent peloton workouts. I missed his cross-fit era, which I think I’m quite thankful for,” Sauers joked.
He also shared a story from his first-year at Gettysburg while taking an introduction to Civil War era studies course with Carmichael. A few weeks into the semester, Sauers’ grandmother died. Following this, Sauers said Carmichael “invited me into his office just to talk about nothing in particular. He asked me about my family, how I was holding up and the like. Our conversations were very similar for the next few years, always asking about my parents, siblings and what the Sauers family was up to.”
He praised Carmichael’s interest in the success of his students.
“That kindness has always meant a lot, but it was not unique in receivables. Pete cared deeply about us as students. He wanted us to learn the material, yes, but he was also deeply invested in our growth as people,” said Sauers.
Further, he said he took Carmichael’s courses not only out of a love for history, but because of Carmichael’s energy.
“That energy was contagious. Few things drag a college student out of bed at 8:30 a.m. His humor, his charm and compassion are what I remember in those days,” he said.
CWI interim director and history professor Jill Titus took the podium next, reflecting on her time working closely with Carmichael.
“He and I worked closely together for 12 years, which is about 4,380 days. There was not one of them in which he was predictable, or conventional, or barring the period surrounding his cancer diagnosis, one in which he didn’t make me laugh,” said Titus. “When he breezed into the office, he brought chaos with him. There was at least a one-in-three chance that before he breezed back out again, I’d be helping him find a lost phone, water bottle or set of car keys, or picking up the cough drop wrappers and bits of paper that he always seemed to be dropping in his wake a la Hansel and Gretel.”
Titus remembered the humor that Carmichael brought to the CWI office.
“He also brought so much laughter with him when you heard that door bang, he could break the tension of the most stressful of days with a ridiculous comment, and there was no one upping him,” she said. Titus recalled how Carmichael “relished telling people absurd stories about me,” and recalled one particular time in which he jokingly told a group of students that Titus only listens to death metal without her knowledge.
Despite his pranks, Titus shared that “Pete’s charisma and larger than life personality went hand in hand with an authenticity, interest in others and sense of personal loyalty.”
She said that Carmichael was always ready to drop what he was doing to help others in need.
“He could do anything for a friend, a student or a family member. When a colleague was sick, he appeared bearing soup. When my husband was unexpectedly hospitalized last year, he immediately offered to give up his precious summer research time to drive two hours to mow our lawn. When I needed a friend, he cleared his schedule, and he did this for everyone.” she said. “It’s remarkable that he was as productive as he was as a scholar, because he would truly drop everything whenever he thought he could help someone.”
Concluding her remarks, Titus recognized Carmichael’s wife and daughters.
“Beth, Isabel, Cameron, thank you for sharing him with this community for the past 14 years. Gettysburg College is immeasurably richer because Pete Carmichael is here, and will continue to be because of the legacy he leaves. I am richer too for those 12 years, and he was my friend. Pete’s example will always inspire me as a teacher and a scholar, and maybe one day I’ll even give one of those weird bands he was always attempting to introduce me to a try,” she concluded.
Kyle Campanile ’13 shared a personal story in which Carmichael had a significantly positive impact on his life.
“It is not hyperbole to say that Pete and Beth saved my life,” he said.
Campanile shared that he was a student in Carmichael’s first history class at Gettysburg in the fall of 2010.
“I quickly came to appreciate his wit and humor and frankly, his normalcy. Despite his ability and accomplishment and always looking a part of an academic, down in glasses, jacket, trademark scarf, he did not live in an ivory tower. He was a salt of the earth midwesterner who loves sports and comedy and didn’t get used above anyone, least of all his students,” said Campanile
In the summer leading up to the fall 2011 semester, Campanile’s father died.
“Already shackled by immaturity and lacking clear direction and sense of self, these new circumstances threatened to undo me entirely. I was ill-equipped to manage the swarm of emotions and unable or unwilling to pause and ask for help. And so I trudged forward, if you could call it that, stumbling on through the semester until I was totally adrift, drowning in a sea of grief and depression and upheaval. Partying was a coping mechanism,” he said. “If Pete had not called me into his office that day late in the fall, I’m sure that my steady march of self destruction would have continued, my future compromised or over before it really began.”
He explained that Carmichael noticed Campanile’s grades falling and took the initiative to meet with him and listen to his struggles in the wake of his father’s death. After consulting with his wife, Beth, the Carmichael family hosted Campanile in their home for the remainder of the semester.
“When it seemed like no one in the world could understand or care, Pete dropped me a lifeline, affording me an environment where I could slow down, avoid negative influences and begin to heal when the dust settled,” Campanile said.
Campanile explained how because of Carmichael’s actions, he was able to make his goals a reality. After graduating from Gettysburg, he earned his law degree from Washington University in St. Louis and found a job at a law firm in Washington, D.C.
“Modest as these successes may be, not a single one of them is imaginable without Pete, and I feel blessed beyond belief. It is impossible to overstate the impact he’s had in my life, not only for the extraordinary kindness, selflessness, compassion he showed me all those years ago, but also for the continuing mentorship and friendship and for the incredible role model he’s been as a preeminent influence in my life for over a decade,” he said.
Gilder Lehrman NEH chair of civil war studies and history Jim Downs spoke next, praising Carmichael’s scholarly work, especially in his investigation into the lives of individual soldiers during the Civil War.
Downs opened by telling a story from the life of Civil War soldier Charles Bowen of the 12th U.S. Army Infantry, who narrowly escaped death at a battle in Virginia. Bowen is discussed in Carmichael’s book, “The War for the Common Soldier.”
“As a historian, Pete wanted to know why someone like [Bowen] continued to fight despite barely escaping death and witnessing a savage massacre,” said Downs. “The question of what motivated soldiers to enlist during the Civil War has animated scholars for generations, but for Pete the scholarly explanations failed to capture the experience of the common, often illiterate and even semi-illiterate soldier.”
Downs praised Carmichael’s book and its investigation into the motivations of soldiers.
“If this doesn’t sound like your uncle’s Civil War history, then Pete succeeded in accomplishing his goal, to understand soldier’s minds and motivations, their reason and rationale, their decisions and discontent,” he said, also calling Carmichael’s book “bold and brilliant.”
Emily Jumba ’24 spoke next, highlighting Carmichael’s role as an advisor to students. He acted as Jumba’s summer advisor before her first-year at Gettysburg, but continued acting as her unofficial advisor through her college career.
“Years later, he would make comments to me about being my advisor and he truly acted as if I was one of his own advisees, despite surely having a whole list of other people he actually needed to make time for.”
Carmichael encouraged Jumba to apply for a CWI-sponsored Pohanka internship program through her college career. In the spring of her sophomore year, Carmichael recruited her to work as a summer research assistant and even found the budget to pay her.
In the summer going into her senior year, she gave into Carmichael’s insistence that she participate in a CWI-sponsored internship and landed a position at Gettysburg National Military Park. She “loved every moment of the experience,” and “was actually inspired to continue studying public history as one of the minor fields for my Ph.D.”
She thanked Carmichael “for steering me onto a path that I realize I love as much as he thought I would.”
Next, history and Africana studies professor Scott Hancock spoke on the changes that Carmichael brought to CWI.
“We needed the change that [Carmichael] brought. The field of Civil War studies and history had been becoming more diverse in whose stories were being told, more diverse in who was telling those stories and diverse in all kinds of ways — race, gender, class, region, nationally, internationally, simultaneously broader and more specific — and Pete’s work on the thinking and feeling of lives of individual soldiers that Michael and Jim have referred to epitomized that much-needed shift,” said Hancock. “He was passionately committed to making the nation’s story deeper and broader by telling more people’s stories.”
Hancock said that Carmichael liked the spotlight “for all the right reasons,” saying that he used it to teach others how to be better informed and more caring. He also said Carmichael used it to spotlight others.
“I wanna be like Pete. And shouldn’t we all want to be like that? Shouldn’t we all want to have the light shine on us and bring everybody else into the light? We should all want to be like Pete and make people matter. He certainly mattered to us,” concluded Hancock.
Next, Benjamin Roy ’21 spoke, opening by stating “All I ever wanted to be was a Civil War historian. Peter Carmichael taught me what that meant.”
Carmichael was assigned as Roy’s first-year advisor when he started at the school. Roy asked Carmichael how he could get involved in research, to which Carmichael immediately invited him to transcribe a collection of scanned manuscript sources.
“I eagerly accepted the task, but was immediately stymied. I could not read longhand cursive. I had learned cursive back in fourth grade, but the skill had atrophied to the point that where could only make out a handful of the scrolled words,” said Roy.
Roy taught himself how to read cursive again and successfully completed the transcriptions over his first-year.
“At times tedious, I loved the work. It was exactly what I came to Gettysburg to do,” said Roy. “But there’s a problem with this story. Peter Carmichael knew how to read longhand cursive.”
Roy said that Carmichael did not actually need those letters transcribed, but instead wanted the work for Roy.
“I recognize it now as the move of a master advisor. What Pete did was simultaneously provide me with the material to do meaningful research on the Civil War, the skills necessary to study the period and the introduction to the work ethic required to do it well,” said Roy.
CWI assistant director Ashley Luskey was the final speaker of the event. In addition to working together at CWI, Carmichael was the best man in Luskey’s wedding.
She opened, saying, “Today, we are gathered to celebrate the life of Peter Carmichael, but to Pete, every day was a celebration of life.”
She characterized Carmichael as an ambitious and passionate person.
“Pete’s passion for life was infectious. He was simply larger-than-life, impossible to sum up in just a few words. He was a bold visionary with a brilliant mind who filled our office and our lives daily with an unmatched positive energy, and with the most wonderfully profane sense of humor that could make one laugh in the most absurd and most trying of situations,” she said.
She said that Carmichael used all of his time to help others.
“He challenged others. He challenged me, challenged all of us to be more critical thinkers, more curious individuals, more engaged citizens, more decent human beings,” Luskey said.
“I hope you [Carmichael] know what a gift you were to this world, to all of us. Life without you still seems surreal and nearly impossible at times. But as you always calmly reminded us in moments of challenge and adversity in your life and our own, it’ll be fine. We will figure it out. Indeed we will, because you taught us how,” Luskey concluded.
CWI assistant director Ashley Luskey speaking at Peter Carmichael’s Celebration of Life at Majestic Theater. (William Oehler/The Gettysburgian)
At the conclusion of the event, Lowy thanked the speakers and shared that with assistance from Addressing Gettysburg’s Matt Callery, they are compiling 90-second video tributes which can be submitted on the CWI website by Oct. 15.
Lowy also shared information about the Peter S. Carmichael Endowed Scholarship, which has been created thanks to an anonymous donor. This need-based scholarship will be available to students interested in history and the Civil War. Interested persons can donate to the scholarship fund online.
Lowy shared that plans to dedicate a tree on campus to Carmichael are in the works. Lowy then thanked the organizers of the event, Wes Jackson at the Majestic and Rachael White at Hotel Gettysburg for allowing them to use their space for the event. She invited attendees to the reception in Hotel Gettysburg’s ballroom, which included a collection of Carmichael’s favorite snacks.
Editor’s Note: This article was updated to correct two misspelled last names – V. DiFonzo
