Some of the most important battles in the final year of the second world war took place within a hundred miles of Florence and this week the history seminar set out to get a first hand feel for those battles.  First, we visited the Memorial Museum of Liberty (outside of Bologna).  In additions to seeing vehicles that were used during the war including Auschwitz deportation cars and a Sherman tank used in the liberation, students got to view a private 40 minute homemade movie of the days around the liberation shot by the museum’s owner when he was just their age.  After lunch, we visited the Gotica Toscana museum in Scarperia (north of Florence.) The museum maintains the history of the battle for Monte Altuzzo and the allied campaign to break the Nazi “Gothic line.” Students saw armaments and survival gear recovered from the battle. In the museum we were given detailed description of the battle which was carried out primarily by American troops and then went straight to the mountaintop where many of the forts and look out points still remain.