Tribute to Paul Hoskins

Paul Hoskins was born on May 22, 1891 in Warren County, Pennsylvania. Paul was the son of William Stephen Hoskins and Etta Mary Thayer. Not much is known about Paul and his younger life. Paul would eventually end up going to college at West Virginia University in September of 1909 and began studying towards a degree in Mechanical Engineering. Paul was known to be ranked high by his peers in classes and was always giving everything the best of his ability. He was known to be a very good and strong leader and even led the school's cheer team. These strong leadership skills would stay with Paul and help him and others later on in his life. In 1914 Paul would graduate with a Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering. Having no intentions of teaching, Paul would ironically be asked by the school to help teach Mechanical Engineering. Paul became the assistant for Mechanical Engineering for one year. Once that year was over the school promoted him to instructor. Paul would stay at West Virginia University for one more year before resigning.

Next, Paul joined the research staff of the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company, which is based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Due to this participation in research when the US joined the war in April of 1917, Paul was exempted from having to join the war effort. However, this didn't stop Paul and he ended up enlisting in the US Army. He would then be sent to basic training at Camp Lee which is near Petersburg, Virginia. Shortly after he was sent to France and held the title First Lieutenant for the 80th Division, 319th Infantry Regiment.

As the First Lieutenant this meant Paul now had the duty of commanding and leading others into battle. This is where Paul's leadership skills proved helped. Paul was known to be an amazing leader to his men and they even saw him as an idol. Out of all the officers, soldiers appreciated Paul the most. Sadly, Paul would be killed on November 2, 1918 during the Battle of The Argonne Forest also known as the Battle of The Bulge. The Battle of the Bulge played a huge and major role in World War One by being the battle that brought about the end of the war. To this day it remains the US largest military offensive, involving 1.2 million US troops. The battle was stretched along the central western front and would be fought until the Armistice of November 11, 1918. Paul would later on be awarded the Purple Heart for his sacrifice. Due to Paul's ties with the school that is why the school would end up releasing the letter and paying tribute to everything Paul had done not only for the country but for the school as well.

Prior to visiting the West Virginia & Regional History Center I had little to no knowledge about what an archive was. I really wasn't sure what to expect when going there besides just pieces of paper. I had also never really had a care for local history. This was mostly due to the fact I grew up in a small town and there really isn't much local history to learn about. I had always just stuck to the main history topics and the things you learn in class. Doing this project I would be able to learn something completely new. The first thing that I learned about the archive is that most of its collections record local history as well as people's stories. Each and every one of the documents I was able to see was telling me a different story. They might be about the same thing but each person's individual experience of an event is different, meaning each document is different. This made me then realize that each one of these papers is a piece of history. These archival stories differ from the ones you learn in school. The ones from the archives show the emotions of the people. You can get a sense of how the writer was feeling in the moment. This is different to how things are nowadays. In a textbook all you learn is the outcome of the event but with the documents you start to get the full picture of the event.

All of this led me to change not just how I saw local history but how I saw history as a whole. I felt like I now had a much greater appreciation for history and how important it is. I also now realize that local history is important as well because it helps you get a better understanding of what things were like back in the day in your town. I also now see the huge role archives play and how important they are for historians. They not only protect and preserve history but they allow for new history to be created. Since history is all about perspective and how you see a situation, people's views of these documents are also always different. I also think they're important because it can paint you a bigger picture. Archives are also useful to organize documents. They keep track of everything from different times and on different subjects. This allows for an easy way to accurately study history and get a better understanding of events. I think visiting the archives is something that I'd do again in the future. Overall I really enjoyed the experience and feel like I learned a lot from it.