Wright Museum of World War II

Lecture Series: Doug Most - Launching Liberty
2026-06-23 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Wright Museum of World War II, 77 Center Street, Wolfeboro, NH, 03894, United States
Doug Most – Launching Liberty
Lecture and book signing
This enduring book tells the heroic, gripping, yet overlooked story of one of World War II’s monumental achievements—the building of America’s fleet of Liberty ships.

With the shadow of war looming large over American life in 1940, President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew it wasn’t a matter of if the United States would be pulled into battle, but when. He foresaw a “new kind of war,” one that would demand the nation be prepared in ways like never before. America’s most critical need in preparation was not drafting more soldiers or manufacturing more guns. It was building more ships that could carry enormous supplies of weapons, vehicles, medical gear, food, and clothing to US and allied troops around the world. One ship could feed three million men for a day—an entire fleet could sustain troops for years.

Lecture Series: Christine Kuehn - Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor
2026-06-30 19:00 - 20:00
Christine Kuehn – Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor
Lecture and book signing
It began with a letter from a screenwriter, asking about a story. Your family. World War II. Nazi spies. Christine Kuehn was shocked and confused. When she asked her seventy-year-old father, Eberhard, what this could possibly be about, he stalled, deflected, demurred, and then wept. He knew this day would come.
The Kuehns, a prominent Berlin family, saw the rise of the Nazis as a way out of the hard times that had befallen them. When the daughter of the family, Eberhard’s sister, Ruth, met Nazi leader Joseph Goebbels at a party, the two hit it off, and they had an affair. But Ruth had a secret―she was half Jewish―and Goebbels found out. Rather than having Ruth killed, Goebbels instead sent the entire Kuehn family to Hawaii, to work as spies half a world away. There, Ruth and her parents established an intricate spy operation from their home, just a few miles down the road from Pearl Harbor, shielding Eberhard from the truth. They passed secrets to the Japanese, leading to the devastating attack on Pearl Harbor. After Eberhard’s father was arrested and tried for his involvement in planning the assault, Eberhard learned the harsh truth about his family and faced a decision that would change the path of the Kuehn family forever.

Lecture Series: The Freese Brothers Big Band - Honor, Reflect, Remember: The tunes of the War Years
2026-07-07 19:30 - 20:30
The Freese Brothers Big Band – Honor, Reflect, Remember: The Tunes of the War Years

A special musical program to honor America’s 250th birthday.

Cost: Members $12, Non-Members $16

Lecture Series: Randy Otto as Winston Churchill
2026-07-14 19:00 - 20:00
Randy Otto as Winston Churchill

Renowned Churchill-ian Scholar, Randy Otto has carefully honed his humorous, poignant and astonishingly relevant tribute to Winston Churchill – who a Price Waterhouse Cooper CEO survey named The Most Admired Leader Ever.
Cost: Members $12, non-members $16

Lecture Series: The Story of the von Trapp Family presented by Bob Stafford
2026-07-21 19:00 - 20:00
The Story of the von Trapp Family presented by Bob Stafford
Stay tuned for updated information

Lecture Series: Alex Kershaw - Escape the Deep
2026-07-28 19:00 - 20:00
Alex Kershaw – Escape the Deep
Lecture and book signing
In the early morning hours of October 24, 1944, the legendary U.S. Navy submarine Tang was hit by one of its own faulty torpedoes. The survivors of the explosion struggled to stay alive one hundred-eighty feet beneath the surface, while the Japanese dropped deadly depth charges. As the air ran out, some of the crew made a daring ascent through the escape hatch. In the end, just nine of the original eighty-man crew survived.

But the survivors were beginning a far greater ordeal. After being picked up by the Japanese, they were sent to an interrogation camp known as the “Torture Farm.” When they were liberated in 1945, they were close to death, but they had revealed nothing to the Japanese, including the greatest secret of World War II.
Cost: Members $12, non-members $16

Lecture Series: Beth Forrest - WWII & Society, A History of food during WWII and its influence on our Society
2026-08-04 19:00 - 20:00
Beth Forrest – WWII & Society, A History of food during WWII and its influence on our Society
Join us to learn the history of how the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) began in 1946 in New Haven, Connecticut, where it was founded as a vocational institute for returning veterans of World War II. The lecture will also illustrate how WWII changed the way Americans (and the rest of the world) eat.
Beth Forrest, PhD is professor of Liberal Arts and Applied Food Studies at The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. She is the former president of the Association of the Study of Food and Society and a principle investigator of an Andrew F. Mellon Foundation grant for the project “Food Studies, Race, and the Humanities.” She is co-editor of Food in Memory and Imagination: Place, Space and Taste (Bloomsbury, 2022) and a forthcoming book on sauce and identity (Oxford UP, 2023) and has published on a range of topics, from how Americans have imagined eating in hell, to how Americans have framed Spanish identity through “rancid” olive oil, to how eating chocolate in early modern Spain was tied to Catholic theology and sin. Forrest has been quoted widely in the media, including The Wall Street Journal, Better Homes & Gardens, CNN.com, forbes.com, Chicago Tribune, and The Boston Globe, among others. (Hyde Park, NY)

Lecture Series: Laura Kroy - The Shopkeeper of Alsace
2026-08-11 19:00 - 20:00
Laura Kroy – The Shopkeeper of Alsace
Lecture and book signing
When WWII comes for her family, Sarah thinks she’s read. She’s had training, after all, coming of Age during World War I.
The Shopkeeper of Alsace is an uplifting tale of family, love, resilience, and on unstoppable women.
Laura Knoy is an award-winning journalist. She founded New Hampshire’s most widely respected and recognized public radio program, “The Exchange,” which she hosted for 25 years. Laura also worked at the national level; newscasting, hosting and reporting for NPR.

Cruise In to the Wright
2026-08-15 10:00 - 14:00
The Wright Museum will welcome back dozens of classic cars, hot rods, and motorcycles for the 13th annual Cruise in to the Wright! Regular museum admission includes access to the car show.
The Bel-Airs will be on hand to supply live music, and food will be available to purchase from Good Eatz 603 food truck. Come rain or shine for this annual summer event!
Learn more here.

Lecture Series: Cheryl Thomas - Forgotten Souls: The Search for the Lost Tuskegee Airmen
2026-08-18 19:00 - 20:00
Cheryl Thomas – Forgotten Souls: The Search for the Lost Tuskegee Airmen
Lecture and book signing
Forgotten Souls examines the lives of the 27 pilots who went missing while battling the enemy abroad – and honors their lives, their sacrifices and their legacy. This book serves as long overdue closure for the pilots who gave their lives.
Cheryl Thompson is an award -winning investigative correspondent for National Public Radio, and an associate professor of journalism at George Washington University.

Lecture Series: Jonathan Rose - The Federal Reserve's Role During WWII
2026-08-25 19:00 - 20:00
Jonathan Rose – The Federal Reserve’s Role During WWII

The Federal Reserve supported the war effort in several ways: it helped finance wartime spending, fund our allies, embargo our enemies, stabilize the economy, and plan the return to peacetime activities.
Jonathan Rose serves as a historian for the Federal Reserve System and is a senior economist and economic advisor at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

Lecture Series: Peter May - The Open Question, Ben Hogan and Golf's Most Enduring Controversy
2026-09-01 19:00 - 20:00
Peter May – The Open Question, Ben Hogan and Golf’s Most Enduring Controversy
Lecture and book signing

In The Open Question, Peter May turns his attention to this controversial, colorful Hale-America National Open of 1942. Set against the backdrop of World War II, May also tells the stories of other professional golfers in the tournament and the impact of the war on all their lives.
The USGA has never recognized the Hale-America Tournament as an official US Open and remains firm in its stance. It was a decision that bothered Ben Hogan for the rest of his life. The Open Question shows how dominant Ben Hogan was against some of the biggest names in golf, and reveals why he deserves to be recognized as a five-time US Open winner.
Peter May has spent the last four decades covering sports for the Boston Globe, the New York Times, ESPN, and the Hartford Courant. He has spent the last eight years teaching in the journalism program at Brandeis University.

Lecture Series: James M. Scott - Empire of Ashes
2026-09-08 19:00 - 20:00
James M. Scott – Empire of Ashes
Lecture and book signing

Over three days in August 1945, a nation once morally opposed to the bombing of civilians killed 120,000 men, women, and children; doomed tens of thousands more to agonizing death in the weeks and months ahead; and annihilated two cities: Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Empire of Ashes explores the final brutal months of the war in the Pacific, featuring the voices of never-before-heard victims of the atomic bombs. Through interviews with survivors and accounts gleaned from Japanese sources, New York Times best-selling author James M. Scott combines the attacks’ heart-wrenching details with their causes and consequences, from debates within the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, Oakridge, and Hanford to the fallout that would alter decades of life in Japan.
James M. Scott is a Pulitzer Prize finalist and New York Times bestseller author

Lecture Series: Joseph Gluckert - Portsmouth Naval Shipyard: From Sails to Atoms
2026-09-15 19:00 - 20:00
Joseph Gluckert – Portsmouth Naval Shipyard: From Sails to Atoms

For more than 225 years, Yankee ingenuity and craftsmanship have been the keys to success for the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. In this popular lecture, learn about the role and achievements of the Yard in times of war and peace with Joseph Gluckert, Portsmouth Naval Shipyard’s Historian and Heritage Center Director.
