The Lucky Few / Film Screening and Filmmaker Q&A
Today / 12 NOON
East Gallery of the Benton Museum of Art / UConn – Storrs Campus
Open to the Public
To contribute to Veterans’ Day commemorative events at the University of Connecticut, the
Asian and Asian American Studies Institute invites the campus community and the general
public to a documentary film screening of THE LUCKY FEW and a chance to talk with the
filmmaker. The Institute gratefully acknowledges the Benton Museum for supporting its public
educational efforts. AAASI also gratefully acknowledges the Office of Veterans Affairs at
UConn for assistance in publicizing this event.
Premiering at the Smithsonian Institution in 2010, The Lucky Few film comes to us courtesy of
Jan K. Herman, who made the documentary while serving as the Navy’s Medical Historian.
Herman describes the film as the “story of how a small Navy warship rescued more than 30,000
South Vietnamese fleeing their dying nation in April 1975. How the men of USS Kirk
accomplished this feat while providing humanitarian assistance under unimaginable
circumstances [as] one of America’s shining moments.”
Jan K. Herman was the chief medical historian of the Navy from 1979 to 2012 and editor-in-
chief of Navy Medicine, the journal of the Navy Medical Department, for 30 years. He has
written and produced documentaries for the U.S. Navy highlighting its medical service during
World War II, the Korean War, and Vietnam. Herman has authored more than 50 articles and
monographs plus five books. As a lecturer, he has spoken to many audiences across the United
States, focusing on military medicine, 19th century astronomy and oceanography, and medical
aspects of World War II in the Pacific. He is the recipient of the 2015 Forrest C. Pogue Award
for Significant Contributions to Oral History.
More Info: email fe.delos-santos@uconn.edu or phone 860.486.5083
For more information, contact: James Lee at 2039065115