"Never Forget What They Did Here"
Follow Army 250 as we cover the 2025 Gettysburg Film Festival
The three minutes it took Abraham Lincoln to give the Gettysburg Address immortalized the setting. Gettysburg is where Americans consecrated in blood and affirmed in prose our dedication to the idea that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” Rare are the grounds that hold such mythic power for Americans.
Gettysburg’s unique place in the American story is what led filmmaker Ken Burns to choose it as the home for a film festival dedicated to American history. The Gettysburg Film Festival, launched in 2023, exists to “bring Americans together in a shared appreciation of our history and the stories that make us who we are.”
We are taking a quick break from Army 250’s series on Army-related writers to lift up the Gettysburg Film Festival. This year the theme of the festival is “Victory in World War II”. Events kick off on May 8, 2025, the 180th anniversary of Victory in Europe (V-E) Day. And Army 250 will be there to cover the festival!
Source: Gettysburg Film Festival
This year the festival focuses on films, television shows, and books that tell America’s World War II story. You can see the full schedule here, but storytellers that will be there include Ken Burns, Martin Sheen, Anna Deavere Smith, Robert Edsel of Monuments Men, John Orloff and others from Band of Brothers, Susan Eisenhower, author of How Ike Led, and many others.
I’ll be there to cover the events, talk with the participants and attendees, and ultimately, to help tell this story. As we approach the Army’s 250th birthday in June, I can think of few better ways to draw out how important the Army has been to American society and how deeply the Army is woven into our fabric as a nation.
As historian Harold Holzer once said, “all roads lead to Gettysburg.” But so too do all roads depart from Gettysburg. It is not just a destination we journey back to in order to understand our past, it is a place we carry forward, always bearing with us Lincoln’s charge: “it is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.”
Army 250 is a passion project celebrating the Army’s 250th birthday in 2025. If you enjoyed this piece, please share it with your networks. If you are a new reader, please subscribe below.
Additional Resources:
You can learn more about the festival at its homepage here. It is an in-person experience and there are still tickets available for many of the screenings and other events.
You can see conversation from the 2024 festival that featured Ken Burns, Martin Sheen, Sam Waterston, and Jake Boritt here.
You can also follow the festival on Facebook and Instagram.
If you will be at the festival, please let me know!