Name: President Grant: On the Job Training!
Start: 2025-09-09T18:30:00-04:00
Location: First Congregational Church UCC, St. Joseph

Dr. E. C. (Curt) Fields, Jr., has been an avid and lifelong student of the American Civil War. His interest in portraying General Ulysses S. Grant was driven by that study and his deep respect and admiration for General Grant. Dr. Fields is the same height and body style as General Grant and, therefore, presents a convincing, true-to-life image of the man as he really looked. He researches and reads extensively about General Grant in order to deliver an accurate persona of the General. His presentations are in first person, quoting from General Grant’s Memoirs; articles and letters the General wrote, statements he made in interviews or wrote himself, and first-person accounts of people who knew the General or were with him and witnessed him during events.
Dr. Fields holds a Bachelor and Master’s degrees in Education from the University of Memphis. He later earned a Master’s degree in Secondary Education and Ph.D. in Educational Administration and Curriculum from Michigan State University. He is a career educator having taught for eight years at the Junior and Senior high school levels; then served for 25 years as a high school administrator. He teaches as an adjunct Sociology Professor at the University of Memphis and in Education for Belhaven University, Memphis campus. He is now an Educational consultant and Living Historian.
As a Living Historian, Dr. Fields portrayed General Grant at the 150th Sesquicentennial observations of: Fort Donelson and Shiloh, TN, and Raymond and Vicksburg, MS. He was selected to portray General Grant at the 150th anniversary of Lee’s surrender to Grant at Appomattox Court House, VA, in 2015.
This will be Dr. Fields tenth appearance before our membership. Through his interpretation, we have been able to walk the fascinating journey of U.S. Grant from his early years to the close of the war that so dramatically changed his personal trajectory. Come join us for what promises to be an interesting and entertaining evening.