Featured Articles
The BAR Through World War I
America’s first light machine gun was yet another design from the man from Ogden. When we see John Moses Browning written out, it is usually followed with such adjectives as genius, iconic, brilliant and innovative, [...]
How Black WWI Veterans Shaped The Civil Rights Movement
The hundreds of thousands of African Americans who served in the U.S. Army during World War I and returned home as heroes soon faced many more battles over their equality in American society. While they [...]
During WWI, Missouri’s Home Guard filled in for the National Guard
The Great War depleted the states’ National Guard troops, sending them overseas. Missouri was one of the states that backfilled the domestic duties with unpaid volunteers. During World War I, Missouri was among a handful [...]
America’s WWI Commission on Training Camp Activities
Founding the Commission The idea for the Commission for Training Camp Activities (CTCA) emerged before the United States went to war. In August of 1916, with the prospect of American involvement in World War I [...]
American Failure: WWI Combat Aircraft Production
The United States did not produce any aircraft of its own design for use at the front during World War I. American industry did make two contributions to the airwar. Building the British designed DH-4, [...]
Philadelphia’s Little Italy Responds to Its Motherland’s Declaration of War in 1915
By May 1915, anticipation and apprehension had visibly increased within the Italian colony of Philadelphia. As the Chamber of Deputies in Rome deliberated the decision that would bring their nation to war, Philadelphia’s Italians gathered [...]
The Santa Claus Ship of WWI is needed again
Author Lilian Bell had a wonderful idea for Christmas. The year was 1914 and she could not stop thinking of the suffering children in Europe as World War One raged. She had to help them. [...]
Arsenal of Democracy: A History of RIA from WWI to WWII
ROCK ISLAND ARSENAL, Ill. – The Spanish-American War, and the subsequent Philippine-American War was Rock Island Arsenal’s baptism of fire. These engagements transformed the post from a sleepy backwater to a modern 20th Century arsenal. [...]
The Battle of Nauset Beach — Inside the Little-Known 1918 German Bombardment of Cape Cod
THE U.S. ENTERED the First World War on April 6, 1917, but the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) did not begin operations in France until July. A year later—although it is now mostly forgotten—the U.S. state of [...]
