Dirk deBroekert has had a varied medical career: U.S. Navy medical corps, family practice physician, Civil War doctor.
And today, deBroekert is a World War II Army surgeon. He is part of the 113th Cavalry Living History Group encampment, which, in turn, is part of a busy day of historical programming at Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.
The encampment next to Pearson Air Museum, 1115 E. Fifth St., represents the WWII troops who were shipped from Vancouver Barracks to combat theaters in Africa, Europe, and the Pacific.
Eric Porter, chairman of the Living History Group, said that these events provide a tangible link to America’s military heritage.
Saturday's Events
• Civil War encampment: Re-enactors from the 1st Oregon Volunteer Infantry, a local living history group, will set up a Civil War-era encampment from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the Parade Ground, just south of Officers Row.
• World War II encampment: The 113th Cavalry Living History Group’s WWII re-enactors are just west of Pearson Air Museum, 1115 E. Fifth St., from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
• Nez Perce War: Author Daniel Sharfstein will discuss “Thunder in the Mountains: Chief Joseph, Oliver Otis Howard, and the Nez Perce War,” from 1 to 3 p.m. at the Visitor Center, 1501 E. Evergreen Blvd.
• Vintage base ball: Costumed volunteers from the national park and the 1st Oregon Volunteer Infantry will play “base ball” by 1867 rules at 6 p.m. at the Parade Ground.
“It’s one thing to read about it. It’s another to smell it and touch it,” Porter, from Sherwood, Ore., said Friday after the weekend’s first visitors walked through the encampment.
Not everybody who comes by is a newbie at this sort of hands-on history.
Porter has an M1 in a rifle rack in his headquarters tent. At an earlier re-enactment, an elderly man saw the rifle and asked: “Do you mind if I hold it?”
Go ahead, the re-enactor said.
After hefting the M1, the man told Porter that the rifle was just as heavy as he’d remembered.
These living history events help deBroekert combine two different aspects of his life.
“I practice medicine, and I was in the Navy medical corps. And I have a degree in American history,” deBroekert said.
Through re-enacting, first as a Civil War doctor and now as an 8th Infantry Division surgeon, “It all came together.”
There also will be displays and exhibits inside Pearson Air Museum’s Historic Hangar.
They include an exhibit on Donald Morrow, a WWII Army combat photographer serving in Italy who was awarded a Bronze Star.
