Travel

If you love travel and history but want something more than tourism, consider joining us on our next Pietist Schoolman Tour.

Historians often say that the past is like a foreign country. Even if you were to study an older version of your hometown, you would notice important differences in how people think, feel, and act. But that’s all the more true when we travel mentally across time and physically across space.

In a classroom, teachers and professors can try to help students imagine what it was like to live through the religious upheavals of the Reformation or the mechanized combat of World War II. But what if you did that in Martin Luther’s church or on Omaha Beach? What if you could listen to the words of eyewitnesses describe those events as you see, hear, touch, and even smell the scene for yourself?

Statue of Martin Luther in front of Berlin’s Marienkirche

We believe that historical travel can be not only enjoyable but educational, not just informative but transformative — intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually.

Learn more about our travel philosophy and our guides.

Next Tour

Scandinavia: Past and Present (June 2024)

Join us for a nine-day tour of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, as we explore a ruggedly beautiful part of Europe with a fascinating history. With three nights each in Oslo and Stockholm, two in Copenhagen, and one along the way in the glass country of southern Sweden, we’ll learn about a region of contradictions: a land of fierce warriors and courageous peacemakers, ancient traditions and progressive attitudes, religious devotion and widespread secularization. In particular, we’ll contrast the heritage held by millions of Americans descended from impoverished emigrants with the more recent history of a highly affluent part of Europe that has attracted its own waves of diverse immigrants.

Stockholm’s City Hall (Stadshuset) – CC BY 4.0 (Julian Herzog)

Applications are now open. (Applications closed — look for a 2025 or 2026 tour to be posted this fall.) Download the brochure, then submit your application form and deposit to claim your spot on our tour roster.

Most Recent Tour

The World Wars in Western Europe

Our inaugural tour took 22 people (ages 17 to 72) to Western Europe to explore the history of the two world wars. We started with three days in London and ended with three days in Paris and Munich, but the heart of the trip was a four-day guided tour of battlefields in Flanders, the Somme, and Normandy. Click here to read the full brochure.

Essex Farm Cemetery outside Ypres, Belgium, where a Canadian doctor named John McCrae wrote, “In Flanders Fields the poppies grow / Between the crosses, row on row”
Our 2019 group at the Canadian National WWI Memorial in Vimy, France
As the battle of the Somme began on July 1, 1916, German troops emerged from bunkers in this ravine
Visiting a former German artillery battery at Longues-sur-Mer, overlooking the beaches of Normandy