Kurt Vonnegut, author of Breakfast of Champions, Player Piano, The Sirens of Titan, and Slaughterhouse Five (among other novels and short stories) attended the University of Tennessee in February and March 1944 for seven weeks as a participant in the Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP), which operated from November 1943 until March 25, 1944. His courses and grades included thermodynamics, 68; shop practice, 85; and calculus, 68.
In the 1970s Vonnegut carried on a multiyear correspondence with UT Russian Professor Donald Fiene, who taught at UT from 1974 to 1995. In that correspondence, Vonnegut indicated he had a good time in Knoxville; got mastoiditis in Knoxville; drank beer at the Andrew Johnson Hotel; and square danced in Sevierville, where he also drank corn liquor. While on campus, he lived in the temporary barracks next to the stadium. The correspondence was purchased by the Lilly Library of the University of Indiana in 2002.
Vonnegut returned to campus on April 10, 2001, to give a lecture as part of the Joseph Wood Krutch Lecture series and indicated that his acceptance of the invitation to speak was largely to see the campus again.