Researching World War II Battles

Students in my Memoir '44 History Club will have to research a battle from the Western Front or the Pacific Theater and design a scenario based on their research. We will have chances in our club to try student-designed scenarios, but the research will be more important than balanced and fun scenarios so the first round may need a lot of fine tuning before they work for the game; education and research is, after all, a large part of this club.

Grace Nielsen, the Jewell Elementary librarian, spent over $300 on books that the students can use for their research. Some of the books will give great general information about World War II and United States involvement. Other books will allow students to learn about a specific battle in-depth. Some of the books will help the students grasp the tactics used in a battle or the importance of battles for each side. It's important for students to know all of that information and I believe the wealth of books we now have in the Jewell Library will foster deeper research.

There is one book that stood out as a perfect resource for researching and designing Memoir '44 scenarios. The book is full of 3D artistic drawings of battlefields and overviews of many of the major battles of the war. It's called Great Battles of World War II and was written by John MacDonald. Nearly 200 pages, this hardcover book will be widely used by our club.