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'NAPOLEON FANATICS' AT FSU
by Amy Welch, Managing editor, Florida State Times
On any Saturday night, four or five
students are usually clustered at some restaurant in Tallahassee, exchanging
theories on Napoleon's life, dissecting French Revolutionary War strategies
and discussing their own discoveries on the subjects.
They are Donald Horward's students. One could say they live in the 18th century, and they wouldn't mind.
Horward, director of FSU's Institute on Napoleon and the French Revolution, which opened in 1990, has helped more students graduate with master's degrees and doctorates in the subject of Napoleon than any other professor at any university in the country. Since 1963, FSU has given 30 post-graduate degrees in Napoleonic history. (Harvard has given 14.) And the institute has just received more than $1 million for scholarships for more students.
The reason? Horward's dedication and his excitement about Napoleon's time.
He became interested in Napoleon when he was a sophomore in high school. He was teaching at FSU in 1961, while working on a doctorate from the University of Minnesota, when he worked with his first master's student. Since then he has created a family of Napoleon fanatics at FSU.
"Napoleon was such a fascinating person," Horward said. "He reached such heights and such great lows. He started out controlling Europe and ended up on a small island in the Atlantic."
Horward's enthusiasm is catching. Students come from all over the nation to study Napoleon and the French Revolutionary War at FSU. And the donations to the institute aren't too shabby either.
Ben Weider, an amateur historian and co-founder of the Weider Health and Fitness Inc. empire, just donated $1.25 million to FSU's institute. With a state match, the donation will give the university more than $2.1 million, which will be used for an endowed professorship, the Ben Weider Eminent Scholar Chair in Napoleonic History, and a series of fellowships, research grants and travel grants for students specializing in Napoleonic and French Revolutionary history.
When students are accepted to the program, they are given endless opportunities for study. But the hard part may be getting accepted at all.
Students must live Napoleon. They must prove through grades, interviews and papers that they have more than a fleeting interest in the subject. Doctoral students must know two foreign languages - French and another language that will help them most with their specific research. Master's students must know French.
And they all need big appetites. Every Tuesday, Horward and his students go to a Tallahassee restaurant called the Golden Corral for about four hours at a time. They take turns reading papers they have prepared on their specific interests, and in between the serious discussions, go up to the all-you-can-eat food bar.
"It's kind of a way of life, really," Horward said. "You find that nowhere else in the world."
And people from all over come to Florida State just to get that family feeling.The 28th meeting of the Consortium on Revolutionary Europe, which was at FSU this year, attracted more than 200 people from all over the globe. One-quarter of the papers delivered were written by Horward's students.
Many of his students, who range from the ages of 22 to 50, are studying subjects that have never really been worked on before. One is examining the role of women during the French Revolutionary War, and another is looking at how the art of the time period was influenced. Yet another is studying race relations, and another is looking at the role of governesses, while another is researching the wives of marshals.
Each is required to study in France at least once, and several study in other countries, depending on their research.
When they graduate, Horward said, most of his students go on to teach, write and research Napoleon and his era.
After graduation, the students don't usually forget Horward, who has worked with them four or five years. "I have two drawers filled with 600 to 700 postcards from students over 20 years," Horward said. "I see that and I think, 'Well, I did my job okay then.'"