Goodbye Broadway, Hello France
Something for the weekend. Goodbye Broadway, Hello France. A century ago the first American units had landed in France, the vanguard of the American Expeditionary Forces that would grow to over two...
View ArticlePatton and the Tank: A Love Affair Begins
Through the mud and the blood to the green fields beyond. Brigadier General Hugh Elles, Commander British Tank Corps, Battle of Cambrai Captain George S. Patton was not a happy man. A personal...
View ArticleHow Ya Gonna Keep ’em Down On the Farm?
Something for the weekend. How Ya Gonna Keep ’em Down On the Farm? With music by Walter Donaldson and words by Joe Young and Sam M. Lewis, the humorous song became immensely popular in 1919,...
View ArticleAlvin C. York Addresses the 82nd Division
I had orders to report to Brigadier General Lindsey, and he said to me, “Well, York, I hear you have captured the whole damned German army.” And I told him I only had 132. Alvin C. York … Continue...
View ArticleGas
GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!– An ecstasy of fumbling, Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time; But someone still was yelling out and stumbling And floundering like a man in fire or lime.– Dim, through the...
View ArticleLa Marseillaise
God of mercy and justice See our tyrants, judge our hearts Thy goodness be with us Defend us from these oppressors You reign in heaven and on earth And before You all must bend In your arms, come...
View Article1917 Thanksgiving Day Proclamation
By the President of the United States of America A ProclamationIt has long been the honored custom of our people to turn in the fruitful autumn of the year in praise and thanksgiving to Almighty God...
View ArticleTheodore Roosevelt on 50-50 Loyalty
During World War I Theodore Roosevelt contributed what we would call op ed pieces to The Kansas City Star. They make fascinating reading. It is interesting how many of the issues he discusses...
View ArticleJanuary 8, 1918: Wilson’s Fourteen Points Speech
Without a doubt the most consequential speech he ever delivered, Wilson’s Fourteen Point Speech has been carefully analyzed and debated since it was given a century ago. Delivered to a joint session...
View ArticleOctober 30, 1918: Theodore Roosevelt Responds to the Fourteen Points
As the War was nearing its close, Theodore Roosevelt responded in the Kansas City Star with a blistering assessment of the Fourteen Points that President Wilson was seeking to make the basis of...
View ArticleThe Long Ride of Colonel Young
“Get a good life insurance policy, with your family as beneficiary. Bring your Bible and yourself.” Advice of Charles Davis Young to a friend joining the Tenth Cavalry The first black colonel in the...
View ArticleState of the Union: 1917
Woodrow Wilson began the modern custom of Presidents delivering their annual messages on the State of the Union personally to Congress in speech form. His December 4, 1917 State of the Union...
View ArticleFebruary 26, 1941: Eddie Rickenbacker Cheats Death Again
Eddie Rickenbacker, America’s Ace of Aces in World War I, cheated death in aerial combat many times over France. Between April 29, 1918 and October 30, 1918, with several weeks lost due to being...
View ArticleMarch 1918: The Coming Storm in the West
By March of 1918 most observers of the bloody stalemate on the Western Front realized that it was likely that 1918 would see a great change. On March 3, 1918 Imperial Germany signed a treaty…...
View ArticleMarch 21, 1918: Operation Michael Begins
And then, exactly as a pianist runs his hands across the keyboard from treble to bass, there rose in less than one minute the most tremendous cannonade I shall ever hear…It swept round us in a wide...
View ArticleApril 10, 1918: The Angel of the Trenches Earns His Nickname
Joao Baptista DeValles was born in 1879 in Saint Miquel in the Azores. At the age of 2 his family moved to New Bedford, Massachusetts. His first name anglicized to John, he quickly proved himself a...
View ArticleANZAC DAY 1918
Today is Anzac Day, in Australia and New Zealand. It commemorates the landing of the New Zealand and Australian troops at Gallipoli in World War I. Although the effort to take the Dardanelles was...
View ArticleOperation Georgette Comes to a Halt
On April 29, 1918 the German offensive code named Operation Georgette ground to a halt. It had come tantalizingly close, fifteen miles, of the Channel ports of Boulogne, Dunkirk and Calais. The...
View ArticlePershing Compromises
The guiding star of General Pershing in France was that the Americans were to form a separate Army and operate as a cohesive unit. An Allied Supreme War Council was held on May 1-2, 1918. The...
View ArticleTheodore Roosevelt on Lincoln and Free Speech
On May 16, 1918 Congress passed an amendment to the Espionage Act of 1917, This Amendment is known to history as The Espionage Act of 1918. Here is the text: Whoever, when the United States is at...
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