Month: July 2020

On July 28^th, 1918 President Woodrow Wilson ordered that the flag of Serbia, which was then under Austro-Hungarian occupation, be flown beside the U.S. Flag at the White House.

You can read more about American-Serbian relations during WW1 by clicking here.

Along the Western Front in 1915 soldiers began incurring a previously unknown infectious disease that was originally thought to be an enteric fever. No records were kept (except by the Americans in 1918), but it is thought that the number of allied soldiers thus affected was about 500,000. The soldiers themselves called this disease “Trench Fever”. It was debilitating but the vast majority of those afflicted recovered in a few weeks, and deaths were extremely rare. However, there sometimes were lingering effects, for example, the famous British fantasy writer J.R.R. Tolkien caught Trench Fever in October 1916 and was never returned to full duty. You can read more about Trench Fever by clicking here. ...read more

Jeannette Rankin (1880-1973), the eldest child of a prominent family in Missoula, Montana, was the first female in American history to be elected to federal office. Running as a Republican (which was then considered the ‘cleaner’ party in her state), she represented Montana in two non-consecutive Congressional terms, from 1917-19 and again from 1941-43. She was Progressive, a leading Suffragette, a supporter of worker’s rights and a devout Pacifist. However, she is particularly remembered for her votes against Declarations of War both on April 6th, 1917 and on December 8th, 1941. You can read more about her by clicking on this link. ...read more

Although not widely, known, there were a number of female reporters who were sent to the Western Front to write for American newspapers and, especially, women’s magazines. These reports began coming as the Germans invaded Belgium in August 1914. Some of these reporters were (in alphabetical order): Harriet Chalmers Adams, Mabel Potter Daggett, Rheta Childe Dorr, Eleanor Franklin Egan, Mary Boyle O’Reilly, Mary Roberts Rhinehart, Clara Savage, Maude Radford Warren and Edith Wharton. ...read more