Fifteen-year-old Jonathan Dorminy of McDonough jumped at the chance to research a pivotal moment in American history.

His efforts recently garnered him recognition at the national level.

Dorminy, a homeschooled high-school sophomore, recently placed second in the 2022 National History Day contest for his senior-level dramatic performance of “The Secret Christmas Trip to the White House: Debate and Diplomacy at the Arcadia Conference of World War II.” He also won the special prize for White House History during the event.

Dorminy was one of 66 Georgia students who presented their historical research at the NHD national contest, which was held virtually in June.

The theme was “Debate and Diplomacy in History: Success, Failure, Consequences.”

“My project was piecing together how Roosevelt and Churchill achieved their goals of defending their nations during World War II,” said Dorminy.

He said he got the idea for his research while reading about a Hollywood actor’s experiences in the war.

“Last summer, I learned why the U.S. established bases in the British Isles during World War II when reading a book about Jimmy Stewart’s experience in the Eighth Army Air Force,” said Dorminy. “The Americans and British discussed this and other strategic matters at the Arcadia Conference, which was fraught with debate and diplomacy. Nevertheless, the concepts of unity of command established at Arcadia were the key to Allied victories from North Africa to Normandy.”

Dorminy said he was also surprised by certain elements of Churchill’s “secret” meeting with Roosevelt.

“Churchill had to sail across the Pacific Ocean,” said Dorminy. “The secrecy went as far as Mrs. Roosevelt. She didn’t know Churchill was coming until he showed up at the door. She did not appreciate it.”

This year marked Dorminy’s fourth time entering the contest. He worked on his project for “eight or nine months,” while completing his regular school work. During that time, he read books, and located primary sources and costumes for his performance.

Dorminy also wrote and memorized his script, and was given a 10-minute limit. The final product, said Dorminy, ran for nine minutes and 57 seconds.

“You have to make it short and sweet,” said Dorminy. “I was trying to pack as much sweet into it as I could.”

Dorminy said he enjoyed conducting research on his topic. Still, he acknowledged that other components of the project were a bit more challenging.

“Learning the history is the fun part,” he said. “It’s nerve-wracking to perform, even if it’s not before a live audience. The hardest part of the project is writing the script that actually describes what happened and is also engaging for the audience.”

Dorminy is the latest member of his family to conduct research for National History Day. All five of his siblings have gone to Nationals with their projects, with Jonathan placing highest among them.

Participants in the contest conduct research with the assistance of a teacher/sponsor. For his entry in the contest, Dorminy enlisted the assistance of his mother, Ann.

Ann Dorminy said NHD has allowed her children to pursue “interest-based learning.”

“A lot of times, you’ll find that children learn better if they’re studying something they picked,” she said. “National History Day is the perfect opportunity to experiment with that. They will end up using their entire curriculum.”

Ann Dorminy said she enjoyed watching Jonathan conducting his research.

“He was really giving it his all,” she said. “It wasn’t about winning. It was challenging himself to do the best job he could. Once he got to the point that he knew as much about this conference that he needed to know to complete his project, he went beyond that. It was his passion.”

Ann Dorminy said she didn’t realize her son’s work would be recognized more than once this year. “Not only did he win both placement and a special award, which is unusual, but he also received the Chronicling America Historian recognition for using the Library of Congress’ repository of old newspapers in his research,” she said.

Despite being in 10th grade, Jonathan Dorminy has college credits in programming, biology, psychology, and English, and is pursuing a rigorous academic program. He hopes to become an engineer specializing in radio frequency technologies.
Dorminy is scheduled to present his performance at Peachtree City’s Commemorative Air Force World War II Heritage Day at Falcon Field on October 8. He said the NHD project taught him the value of hard work.

“I put a lot of time and effort into putting together a good project, and I won, but that’s a bonus,” said Dorminy. The main thing is overcoming fear of public speaking and being critiqued.”