Featured Articles
After 80 Years, the Fate Of the USS Cythera (PY-26) and Her Crew Still Remains a Mystery
The USS Cythera (PY-26) has several distinctions. She started out life as a civilian yacht before being acquired by the US Navy, and later went on to serve in both World War I and II. Her service [...]
American Women in World War I: Marion Randall Parsons: Writer, artist, mountain climber, Red Cross worker
San Francisco-born Marian Randall (1878–1953) was the daughter of druggist Charles Wells Randall and his wife, Nancy Garabrant Randall, and had four siblings. An enthusiastic mountain climber, she ascended at least 50 peaks. In 1907, [...]
Women in World War I Sparked Remarkable Changes
It was the cultural norm that married women and many single women stayed home tied to the household and did not work. So, how, and when did American women enter the workforce? The answer is [...]
Forever Lost at Sea: Navy’s WWI Collier USS Cyclops
Over a century later, the whereabouts of the collier USS Cyclops remains unknown and might never be known… forever lost at sea. “Weather Fair, All Well.” That was the last known message radioed by one [...]
William J. Powell, Aviator and Entrepreneur
William J. Powell was a tireless promoter of African American participation in the budding field of flight. In an era when daredevil pilots captured the imagination of the masses, Powell recognized that aviation also presented [...]
WWI American Pilots Wanted A Great Fighter Plane. Instead, They Got The Nieuport 28.
The Americans flying in World War I wanted the Spad XIII. They got the Nieuport 28 instead. Near dawn on April 2, 2022, a vision from the past accelerated down a grass airstrip in rural [...]
A family tie to U.S. Navy ship Cyclops led to three books about the WWI mystery ship
I was first acquainted with the existence of the U.S. Navy ship Cyclops when I was quite young. Occasionally I would spend some time at my grandparents’ shop in Baltimore where my father worked. On [...]
Harlem Hellfighters: Who Were They?
The 369th Infantry, whose members called themselves Harlem’s Rattlers, became the most famous all-black regiment to fight during World War I. By the end of the war, 171 of the regiment’s men received individual Croix de [...]
History of VA in 100 Objects/Object 52: Native American Recruits
At the start of the Great War in 1914, only about half of the 300,000 Native Americans in the United States were citizens. Although the Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to all “persons born or naturalized [...]
