Edward Klekowski
Professor Emeritus, Biology Department, UMass Amherst 
Documentary Filmmaker

Ed Klekowski joined the UMass Amherst faculty as an assistant professor of Biology in 1968 and retired in 2005.  He has published more than 80 scientific papers in the area of evolutionary genetics and has been a visiting scholar at the University of Freiburg in Germany, and Cambridge University and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in England.  He continues to research local history and work on new documentary projects and is an adjunct professor of history at UMass Amherst. 

Ed has explored the unchartered depths of the Connecticut River, the Quabbin Reservoir  and Lake Pleasant.  He has melded biology, geology, history and underwater archeology to create presentations for speaking engagements, the press, the web, museums, the public school system and public television.

Ed led the first group of divers ever to go under Quabbin in search of the remains of four towns permanently erased from the Swift River Valley to make way for the reservoir 60 years ago.  “Time has healed the land,” Klekowski tells viewers.  “But underwater, destruction is laid bare as if it happened yesterday, revealing a tragedy of enormous proportions.”  His program for WGBY, Under Quabbin, was a record setting fundraiser for that station and has been replayed several times in Springfield and Boston.  Archival photos of the lost towns in their heyday and recollections of former residents complement the documentary’s haunting underwater footage.

Recently he said, "Producing Under Quabbin was a life changing event for me; I discovered that there was a new direction I wanted to take.  I've always viewed myself as a teacher, liking to engross myself in a subject and lecture about what I've learned.  I realized that through public television I had access to a very large classroom – I could teach more students.  It seemed like the logical next step for a teacher."

Documentaries:
Under Quabbin: The Search for the Lost Towns
The Great Flood of 1936: The Connecticut River Story
Dynamite, Whiskey and Wood—The Connecticut River Log Drives 1870-1915

His current documentary projects have moved from the Connecticut River to the First World War battlefields of France, but they still focus on New England history.  Here is a synopsis of two projects in pre-production:

Yankees Fight the Kaiser

The bombs are examples of the kind of unexploded shells that still litter the French battlefields around Verdun.

In World War I all of the National Guards of New England were sent to France as a single regional division, the 26th or Yankee Division (YD).  The YD was composed of units from all of New England.  They were one of the first to reach France and participated in all of the major battles.  For the past few years, with the help of U.S. Army and French historians, Libby and Ed have explored all of the sites on the Western Front where the YD was billeted, fought, and died.  Using old memoirs and maps they were able to find the remains of trenches, fortifications and field hospitals used by the New Englanders.   The following examples give you some impression of the visual and emotional impact of their discoveries:

            Yankee Caves – In one sector of the front, the YD was housed in an extensive cave system near the front line trenches.  The cave is on private property and is not open to the public.  The Klekowskis met the owner of the property who offered to guide them through the caves.  In a tour that lasted four hours, they discovered hundreds of inscriptions left on the walls of the cave by young men of the YD.  The names and addresses from throughout New England that cover the walls provide a walk back through time to 1918.   As Ed said, "Footage of this site will hold even the most historically-phobic viewer's attention."

            Apremont-la-Forêt – In this small village the YD fought its first battle against the Imperial German Army.  French historians provided a copy of a German trench map from 1918.  Thus it was possible to find the remains of the trenches in the woods above the village that were the focus of the American attack.  Surprisingly, even after almost 90 years, the trenches are still full of barbed wire, rusty equipment and unexploded shells.  After the war's end the citizens of Holyoke, Mass commemorating their men who fought and died in Apremont, raised money to rebuild the village.  The central square in the village was renamed Place Holyoke and a monument and fountain to the men of Holyoke stands there.  It was at Apremont that the French Army decorated the YD flag with the Croix de Guerre.  That flag with its decoration is still on display in the State House in Boston.

Model T's to Glory: 1914-1917

From 1914-1917, prior to our entry into the war, hundreds of Americans volunteered to drive ambulances on the Western Front.  Most of the drivers were undergrads from the nation's colleges and universities.  These young idealists funded their own ship passages, bought their own uniforms and worked essentially for room and board.  Many arrived in Paris not knowing how to drive.  In 1914 autos were still very new, so their first task was a crash course with French instructors – it was also a way to brush up on French, at least upon the vocabulary relating to cars and driving.  The majority of the ambulances driven by the Americans were Model T Fords.  Because of its high wheel clearance and unique suspension system, a Model T could reach aid stations that larger vehicles could not.  Thus the T's could get closer to the trenches to pick up wounded, but there was a down side, as the ambulances often became targets for German guns.

            The documentary will tell the story of these daring young men and their nimble Model T's.  It focuses on the American Ambulance Field Service (after 1916 known as the American Field Service, the AFS) and the work it did at the front from 1915 to 1917, especially in the Verdun area where in 1916 they carried over 250,000 wounded.  The AFS was founded and led by A.Piatt Andrew, a Harvard professor and later congressman for Massachusetts.  Because of Andrew, many of the ambulanciers came from Massachusetts.  The French Army decorated individual American Field Service sections nineteen times for bravery.  Of the thousand American ambulanciers, no less than two hundred and fifty were individually decorated for acts of heroism and service to France, receiving the Croix de Guerre, the Légion d'Honneur, or the Medaille Militaire.  After the war, the French Ambassador to the United States sent this message of gratitude:

  "Lives saved by the thousands, suffering attenuated, amputations avoided, families spared their fathers for after the war; these form only a part of the French debt toward the American Field Service."

            Yet today the story of these American ambulanciers is largely forgotten.  Americans know little of the First World War, and what they do know centers on General Pershing and the American Expeditionary Force.  But for three years prior to America's entry into the war, Americans were already "over there."  The proposed documentary will tell their story.

About Ed Klekowski and his work:

http://umassmag.com/Spring_2006/River_Keeper_1124.html
http://www.bio.umass.edu/biology/conn.river/quabbinres.html
http://www.bio.umass.edu/biology/conn.river/
http://www.bio.umass.edu/biology/conn.river/online_course.html
http://www.wgby.org/localprograms/logdrives/bio.html
http://www.bio.umass.edu/biology/conn.river/newspaper.html