After graduating with a BA in History from UVM in 1974, Terrence Petty went on to a journalism career that placed him up close with some of the late 20th century’s most significant events.
In a fall 2024 conversation, he reflected on how his time on campus – and the relationships that began at UVM – helped lead to a life of witness and inquiry, and to lessons we might learn from the history of these times.
A Champlain Valley Childhood Led to UVM
A taste for the past developed early for the Vermont native. “I've always been a student of history,” he remembered. “I grew up in the Champlain Valley, which is just filled with historical sites from the French and Indian War, from the Revolutionary War, and even from the War of 1812.”
History connected to his own family too. “I knew all these sites and their history because I got it from my dad, and I got it from school. My dad's ancestors were French Canadian. They came down the Champlain Valley, settled on the west side of Lake Champlain and then moved across to Vermont … My mother’s family name is St. John, and the St. Johns moved to Vermont from Connecticut in the 1780’s." The family's legacy there remains, he notes. "There’s still a road near the Hubbardton Battlefield historical site called St. John Rd.”
An inquisitive mind and a legacy bound with history were always present. But it was at UVM that his curiosity would really take flight. With the encouragement of faculty in the History Department, he got to not only learn the facts and events of world history but to apply older traditions of engaging with that history.
He deeply appreciated the chance to engage in meaningful discourse, a concept that goes back to the Enlightenment. “Another thing I learned from my history classes is a love of concepts that came right out of that period. The use of reason, the use of logic, the use of evidence, which in modern times includes collecting and looking at physical documents and applying critical thinking to that examination. These are all things that led me to journalism specifically.”
“What I learned at the University of Vermont, which is absolutely crucial and has formed the core of my personality, is, at its heart, the desire to know stuff, anything at all.” He laughed, “My mother complains about it! 'Would you stop asking questions?!' But that's the experience at the University of Vermont that encouraged me and helped me discover who I am.”
UVM Paved a Path to Graduate Studies in Philosophy - on the Way to Journalism and Research
History was just one of the places in the College of Arts and Sciences where he remembers feeling a deep affinity. “I took English classes and I took philosophy classes, and I found myself in a bit of a fight for what I felt most called to - between history and philosophy.
“In the history department, the professors that I remember were the great RV Daniels, a prominent Russian and Soviet history specialist. And Wolfe Schmokel, where I honed my interest in German history. And Bill Metcalfe taught Canadian history. And then there was Will Miller in the philosophy department.”
It was Dr. Miller who steered Terrence towards philosophy at Colorado State and the opportunity to study with “this pretty famous philosophy professor, who was English and he had taught at Cambridge and in fact he was a student of Ludwig Wittgenstein and the philosophy professor's name was, (and this is absolutely true!) Wisdom. His name was John Wisdom, Professor John Wisdom, professor of philosophy.”
Terrence laughed again, remembering Dr. Wisdom dryly suggesting that he consider a field more lucrative than philosophy. “Like poetry, for example.” And though he laughs now telling the story, he says that the quip helped guide him towards journalism as a better career choice.
That thinking led Terrence back to Vermont, and to his first reporting job, with the Addison Independent newspaper. From there were positions in Plattsburgh, Syracuse and Albany. It was while in Albany that he noticed that Associated Press had an office in the building housing his employer at the time: the Albany Times-Union.
“Given my interest in German culture and history, and because I knew the possibilities at the Associated Press (AP), including working overseas, I went upstairs, introduced myself to the AP bureau chief, and told him I wanted to go to Germany. And before long I was brought down to New York City to work on what was called the foreign desk, which in many ways was like a grad school in international affairs. It was wonderful.”
He waited for his turn in the “pipelines” through which journalists with the right skills and availability would match with open positions. Terrence had married Christina Peterson, his college sweetheart and also a Vermont native, in 1980. One thing that brought them together was a thirst to experience foreign cultures. In summer of 1987, he and his family (which by now included son Tristan) were sent to Germany.
He recalls the time that followed as “an incredible ride,” one that included the “East German revolution, all kinds of spy scandals, the Berlin Wall. I was sent to Poland, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, all those places where democracy was bubbling up. Major disarmament agreements. And there are various conferences and treaties that were signed, G7 summits and European Summits… I got to interview incredible people both famous and infamous. As you can imagine, it was a very exciting time.” Through all of those assignments and stories, his experiences at UVM provided a foundation. “What I learned as a humanities student enriched my life. Wherever I traveled, those studies made me more open to learning and to understanding and to trying to overcome whatever preconceptions or biases I might have."
“When I wrote about Bosnia, for example, knowing a bit of the history and literature of the more distant past, the 1500s, the 1600s, was just very important to being a credible journalist. For one thing, I didn't come across as someone who couldn’t even imagine life outside of US borders.”
Retirement Meant Delving into Research
Perhaps it’s inevitable that nearly three momentous decades writing about world events would create a flow of story ideas for future exploration.
When he retired in 2017, those stories were able to come into focus.
His first book -- Enemy of The People -- was published by The AP in 2019. It tells the story of the Munich Post newspaper, which spent nearly a dozen years trying to prevent Hitler from coming to power. The Post “did things that today would be considered investigative journalism,” Terrence said. “They collected documents from inside sources within the Nazi Party, informers within Hitler's closest circle who told them everything that was going on in party headquarters, including some embarrassing secrets about Adolf Hitler himself. They started publishing articles in roughly 1922, and they were relentless in their pursuit of him."
That book explored what the paper did, how they how they did it, how they got this explosive information, and ultimately their failure in the effort to keep him from coming to power. In April 2020, Terrence came back to UVM to talk about the work. He expresses gratitude to Raul Hilberg Distinguished Professor of Holocaust Studies Professor Alan E. Steinweis for his ongoing support here at UVM, noting that Professor Steinweis “invited me to the campus to give a presentation on the first book, and also to attend a couple of his classes. It felt great to be back on my home campus. I felt like I was giving something back, so that was a great joy for me.”
Professor Steinweis also provided support and a blurb for Terrence’s second book, Nazis at the Watercooler, which was released in November 2024 by University of Nebraska Press.
Research on the work had begun in 2015 when Terrence learned that German government agencies had commissioned inquiries by independent historians to look at documents from 1945 and after. These “had been in German government archives, kept under lock and key, since the end of the war, and so this was the first time that historians or anybody had gotten to see them. Historians started publishing results of their studies, and I started gathering and reading the books.”
What was revealed was startling. “Every single important German government agency ended up opening up its files to reveal these secrets. And those secrets showed that West German government agencies during the Cold War were infested with former Nazis, people who worked for the Third Reich, including some major war criminals. The documents also show American collusion, that Allies actively opened doors for these Third Reich employees. And the Americans used a number of these war criminals themselves” as intelligence agents.
Different approaches were possible, he observed, touching on nuances informed by a wide-spanning academic and journalistic career.
He shared, “No comprehensive, serious vetting system was set up to carefully examine the pasts of job candidates, and there was no serious attempt to bring back experienced civil servants who had fled Nazi Germany or who had lost their government jobs during the Third Reich for ideological or racist reasons."
“What should have happened, in my view, is that the Allies should have insisted that postwar German governments set firmer standards for hiring: rigorous background checks, determination of whether a candidate may have been guilty of a war crime, etc. These kinds of demands weren't made because the Western Allies — and especially the US — were worried that the West Germans would be less willing to join the West's anti-Soviet cause. There was also some concern that rubbing West Germans' noses into the dirty past might make them less amendable to democracy. Morally, and politically, this is an extremely fraught matter, and one that is not black and white," Terrence shared.
“One possibility could have been creation of a German Truth and Reconciliation Commission, like the one that was set up in South Africa in the 1990s, where injustices were brought out into the open through witness testimony. Such a commission could have promoted reconciliation and forgiveness among perpetrators and victims in West Germany.”
In fraught times, then and now, an awareness of history and a way to grapple with truth and impact, mean that humanities scholars have a special role and opportunity as we move into the future.
Advice for Today's Students
We asked what advice he would offer to students in the humanities today.
He thought for a bit and said, “What I love to do is gather documents and look at documents. Gather information that's true, has been documented and is verifiable.
“The whole point of going to college or university is gaining information, acquiring knowledge.
“This is what my education taught me. And what my experience has taught me is the importance of telling the truth. That's what I try to do. I try to tell the truth.”
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Class Notes Extended: Terrence Petty ’74, Researcher, Historian, Author
Cheryl Carmi
Feb 13, 2025