I will never forget the support I received from the Laurier Centre for the Study of Canada, Laurier, and the Tri-U at large. I accomplished a lot as a graduate student, but I also met some truly wonderful colleagues and life-long friends that I wouldn’t have, had I not decided to move to Waterloo in 2015. Thank you to all.
From admission to the sanatorium for medical treatment to navigating life as chronically-ill ex-soldiers, Eric Story's PhD dissertation looks at the experiences of veterans diagnosed with tuberculosis during and after the Great War. It tries to understand and unpack how tuberculous soldiers’ dual status as tuberculosis sufferers and disabled veterans impacted their lives over the course of the twentieth century.
Eric successfully defended his thesis, "Scarred by the White Plague: A Health History of Tuberculosis and the Great War," on Tuesday, March 5, 2024 at Wilfrid Laurier University. He was supervised by Dr. Mark Humphries at Laurier. His committee members were Dr. Amy Milne-Smith, also of Laurier and Dr. Erika Dyck, of the University of Saskatchewan. The external examiner was Dr. Serge Durflinger, University of Ottawa.
Dr. Story began an Associated Medical Services Postdoctoral Fellowship at Brock University in January that looks at veterans of the Second World War and their experiences with tuberculosis. He will also start a second postdoctoral fellowship at Western University in 2025.
During his studies at Wilfrid Laurier, Eric worked at the Laurier Centre for the Study of Canada as their Outreach Manager and Copp Scholars Program Coordinator.
In 2022, Eric won the Tri-U PhD essay prize for his article, “The Indigenous Casualties of War,” that also won the Canadian Historical Review’s Best Article Prize in 2021.