Visual effects help Alma student earn first place History Day award

Caleb Ferguson didn’t just visualize his History Day project – he actually lived it.

The Alma junior was among a contingent of Alma High School and Alma Middle School winners at the Region 9 History Day competition at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith. Next month, Ferguson will compete in the State History Day competition at the University of Central Arkansas.

“I made a documentary about the long-term revolutions of Puerto Rico,” Ferguson said. “I lived there for about three years. It was a pretty neat experience. I wanted to dive deep into the history of Puerto Rico, and how Americans went there and kind of took over …

“We kind of own it, but we let them govern themselves.”

Ferguson chose his topic as part of AP U.S. History teacher Mary Joslin’s class.

“With Mrs. Joslin’s class, we didn’t really talk much about Puerto Rico, but we talked about how Americans colonized a lot of places, including Puerto Rico,” Ferguson explained. “We colonized Puerto Rico back in 1898. They (Puerto Ricans) became U.S. citizens in 1917.”

The Fergusons, parents Matthew and Kerri and kids Caleb and Cali, lived in Puerto Rico between 2015-18. They swam, went to the beach a lot, and endured hurricanes – two of them, actually, in a span of a few weeks in September 2017.

“They (Puerto Ricans) spoke a lot of Spanish, but also a sort of Spanglish … they would throw in a lot of random American words in the middle of speaking Spanish,” Ferguson said. “I had to pick up some Spanish, but I was homeschooled and I didn’t have to learn all of it for school. A lot of the people in the neighborhood we lived in spoke mainly Spanish, but there were a few kids from America that spoke English.”

Ferguson took first place in the Individual Documentary category at the Region 9 History Day event. Five of his classmates, Payton McCain (Individual Exhibits); Annabeth Sanderson and Maddie Major (Group Exhibits); Daniel Dyer (Historical Paper) and Lucas Hayes (Individual Website), also took first place.

“It was cool going there (History Day) because a lot of Alma people actually moved on,” Ferguson said. “It was cool to get first place in the documentary because here’s a guy from Alma making a video about another country; you’re representing your hometown and another place you actually lived.”

Born in Little Rock and raised in Oklahoma, Matthew Ferguson’s government work took the family to Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, in 2015. The Fergusons lived for three years in a neighborhood called Camino Del Mar in the town of Toa Baja, a modest city along the north coast of Puerto Rico that dates back to 1511.

“We went to the beach almost every day, but I got bored with it,” Ferguson said. “I stopped swimming and would just sit there and read books. We were at home a lot, too, because there was a lot of dangerous stuff I didn’t know about until after we left.”

In September 2017, the family survived two Hurricanes in the same month, including Hurricane Maria, a category 5 storm that caused widespread damage.

“The second one (Maria), my mom and sister and me went to stay with my aunt,” Ferguson said. “My dad stayed behind to help them rebuild and clean up after the hurricane.”

Ferguson said he’ll get to tinker with his video prior to the April 9 History Day event.

“It’s at UCA, where I’m thinking about going to college,” he said. “They offer films, and that’s what I want to go into when I’m older. It would be cool to make a video that they, possibly professors and teachers, get to see. I Livestream for my church, sometimes, and I make short videos on my own and I enjoy scriptwriting, too.”

An outstanding soccer player for Coach Cory Sturdivant’s team, Ferguson is fluent in English and Spanish, though to sharpen his skills, he’s currently enrolled in Spanish III.

“I can say some sentences,” he said. “I work at Atwoods, and occasionally if they have someone who speaks Spanish that needs help, my manager will call me over and I can help them.”