MOORPARK : Students Bring History to Life

Moorpark middle-school student Navroop Mitter said he chose to dress as Julius Caesar because he admires the Roman emperor.

“He was a dictator, and I always wanted to be that,” said Navroop, 11.

But you wouldn’t find any students dressed as Adolf Hitler on Historical Figure Day, which was held Wednesday at Chaparral Middle School. During the annual event, most of Chaparral’s 1,000 sixth- through eighth-grade students came to school dressed as figures from history, and each impostor delivered a short oral report on the person he or she represented during history class.

“No Adolf Hitlers. No Pancho Villas,” said Bryan Case, who teaches eighth-grade U.S. history. Each student was required to pick a figure who had a positive influence on history, Case said.

Asked whether Pancho Villa wasn’t considered to be a hero of the Mexican Revolution, Case said, “overall, you couldn’t say he was positive, especially for American history.”

Angel Chairez, 14, a student in Case’s class, dressed as cowboy-dentist John H. (Doc) Holliday. Angel, who wore a poncho for the event because Clint Eastwood “was a cowboy and he always had his poncho,” grinned as he told his classmates that Holliday had killed 16 people.

“I thought he was supposed to be a positive influence,” one girl yelled out to Case after Angel’s presentation.

Holliday “fits into that gray area,” Case responded.

Many girls dressed as male historical figures. But no boys have chosen to appear as famous women since Chaparral began the event several years ago, Case said.

To represent Henry VIII, sixth-grade student Jennifer Branstetter, 11, wore a white frock decorated with gem-like glass buttons. Black lines drawn on her cheeks and chin gave her a beard.

“I found out from my brother he was an interesting man,” Jennifer said of the monarch. “He had six wives, and he killed two of them.”

Many students said family members had given them ideas for historical figures.

But sixth-grader Danielle Schreck, 11, had another source.

With a white sheet draped over her shoulder and a vine from her back yard pinned in her hair, Danielle said she represented Socrates.

“I saw him on ‘Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure,’ and he looked pretty neat to me,” Danielle said.