Instructor: Alston Brown

Dates: Tuesdays, 11/3, 11/10, 11/17, 11/24

Time: 12-3pm

Location: Wellfleet Preservation Hall

Bitten by the acting bug? Have a monologue, soliloquy, piece of text that you’ve been wanting to bring to life but haven’t had the chance? In this course, we will take speeches from plays and other source material, and workshop them from first read through to performance. This is an acting class, so come ready to get on your feet and dive into the process of exploring this exciting textual form. 

Instructor: John Dennis Anderson

Dates: Wednesdays, 10/21, 10/28, 11/4, 11/11, 11/18

Time: 1pm-3pm

Location: Wellfleet Preservation Hall

Washington Irving and his work have been a pervasive presence in American pop culture for over two centuries. Best known as the author of mythical tales of a terrifying Headless Horseman and Rip Van Winkle’s twenty-year sleep, Irving was the first professional American man of letters. His pop cultural legacy ranges from Joseph Jefferson’s 40-year-run on stage as Rip Van Winkle, to Irving himself as a character in the 1938 Broadway musical Knickerbocker Holiday, to many film and TV adaptations of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” that include Walt Disney’s 1949 animated version, Tim Burton’s 1999 horror film Sleepy Hollow, and a popular 2013-2017 TV series. The class will read select works by Irving and adaptations of them and survey the range of works he inspired .

Instructor: Lewis Shepard

Dates: Wednesdays, 9/23, 9/30, 10/7, 10/14, 10/21

Time: 10:30am-12pm

Location: Zoom

For many Americans when they think of boats on the water, Noah's Ark springs to mind.  World literature, often with illustrations, is a starting point when we recall images of life on waters, both fact and fiction,( think of Kon Tiki, Moby Dick, Huckleberry Finn)  Here in Massachusetts we have the USS Constitution, launched in 1797 and still afloat in Boston Harbor. 

Cultural traditions, religion, commerce, have been a part of nautical visions that began in Egypt and continues today. Illustrated books, poetry, fact and fiction, movies, music and the theatre are interwoven with our thoughts of life on the water. Here on Cape Cod we have much to consider, one of the reasons for this class. The history of New England, even including Vermont's Lake Champlain, is replete with source material.

Instructor: Maurice Isserman

Dates: Thursdays, 10/8, 10/15, 10/22, 10/29

Time: 3pm-5pm

Location: Wellfleet Preservation Hall

Maurice Isserman, co-author of the 2008 Banff Prize-winning history of Himalayan mountaineering, Fallen Giants, will be drawing on his soon-to-be-published history of climbing around the world  to provide an overview of  mountaineering from its origins down to the present.  Among other climbs, the first ascents of the Matterhorn, Denali, Nanda Devi, the North Face of the Eiger, and the West Ridge of Everest will be covered.  One week will be devoted to the history of the US Army’s 10th Mountain Division in World War II, with Isserman’s Winter Army as the main text.  The course also considers topics related to the cultural and political background of mountaineering, including European Romanticism, American Transcendentalism, the British Empire, and Nazi Germany.

Image: Hamilton College students in Maurice Isserman's Himalayan seminar, on a trek to Annapurna Base Camp, 2025.

Instructor: Marc Strauss

Dates:Thursdays, 10/8, 10/15, 10/22, 10/29, 11/5

Time: 6-8pm

Location: Zoom

For as long as there have been entertaining musicals in the United States, edifying political commentary has often played a secondary or subliminal role in the art form. For every frivolous Cats (1981) there is an intense Hamilton (2015), matchmaking Hello, Dolly! (1964) a historically relevant 1776 (1969), flippant Funny Face (1927) a satirical Of Thee I Sing (1931). Even in shows that are ostensibly all about fun—say, Irving Berlin’s 1933 As Thousands Cheer, with songs and sketches loosely based on news of the rich and famous—the somber “Supper Time” tells the story of a woman making dinner for a husband who will never return home…from his lynching. In the hyper-energetic, feel-good musical Hairspray (2002), “I Know Where I’ve Been” sings of the long fight for racial equality.

During this five-week course, Marc Strauss, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, Conservatory of Theatre and Dance, Southeast Missouri State University, will introduce, show DVD and YouTube videos, and lead discussion on a host of songs and dances from American musicals across eras and regions that seriously address cultural and political issues. During our country’s 250th year in 2026, the course will culminate with the showing and analysis of the Peter H. Hunt-directed Hollywood film 1776, from 1972—created as a lead-up to our 200th anniversary in 1976—written by Peter Stone with music and lyrics by Sherman Edwards