A Century Ago

Today we should remember all veterans who served. I would like to focus on those who fought in World War 1.

It is hard for us to understand what it was like back then. I once read that at the start of the war two-thirds of Americans had never traveled outside the county in which they were born. Now they were going across an ocean to fight in what was then called the World War. It was particularly brutal with trench warfare and poison gas. Many never came home. Others were never the same mentally and/or physically. Some saw a bigger world with more possibilities than they had imagined. One such man was a farmer named Harry Truman.

Those left behind were very patriotic. Sometimes that led to attacks against German-Americans. I have some letters my grandmother wrote. She was willing to lose her brothers and wished she could go as well. She turned a bedroom into a shrine with American flags and pictures of her brothers.

Everything changed a century ago today. An armistice was declared. Our soldiers were returning home. It marked the emergence of America on the world stage.
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Now they are gone. The last surviving soldier died in 2011. We have seen a lot of wars since then. Hopefully the memory of their service will live on.
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