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Kim's Articles of
WWI & WWII
War of the Worlds

World War I	World War II	During Both and Between WWI & WWII
Causes Leading to WWI	World War II American Fashion	Dictators
Wartime Communication 1914 - 1918	Coding and Decoding: A Way of Communication During WWII	The Roaring Twenties
Warbirds	V-Day: Victory-in-Europe Day	Slang: Twenties and Forties
	Events in History: Fads and Innovations During WWII	Memorial Day: A Memorial For Those Who Died
	German U-Boats of WWII
	D-Day: Invasion of Normandy

WAR OF THE WORLDS

In this neighborhood we'll attempt to bring you the effervescence of the life and times during WWI and WWII eras. This area will consist of how people dressed, how they worked, their lifestyle and what they did for fun. Life on the home front of America as well as overseas in England, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Japan, etc. will be discussed.

How did people cope with war times both emotionally and physically, those engaging in battle and those striving to live a normal life through these hard times? What did people eat? Was their food rationed? And how was it rationed?

WWI (1914-1918)a war that started because of a European conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia on July 28, 1914. Here we'll learn the causes of this war, about the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era, about the thirty-two nations involved, and the powers behind the war starting with the American president, Woodrow Wilson; French prime minister, Aristide Briand; and wartime prime minister of the United Kingdom, David Lloyd George. Where did the war start? What was America's involvement? Also what were the people's reactions to the start and the end of the war?

How did the men fighting dress, eat, and keep warm. The service's ranking system will be discussed. Articles on the major players, how they calculated and made their strategic moves from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Adolf Hitler; from General Patton of the United States to Marshal Philippe Petain of France during WWII (1938-1945). What triggered the war and the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. The Holocaust--why and how the Jews were treated by the Germans? How the war ended? D-Day--what happened and how it happened. How did the people react to the end of the war and how did they feel about the Americans.

We'll talk about the guns, tanks, and aircraft used during these wars. In this article we'll talk about when, how and where certain weapons were used and why they were picked at that particular time.

Other non-war issue questions you may need to know such as: Who were the well-known best selling authors, favorite actors/actresses, favorite artists, etc.?

But all in all we'll have fun traveling through the world of time together. And by all means let us know if there's anything else you'd like to see in this area.

World War I

Causes Leading to WWI

There's a ton of information out there on the causes of WWI. Why you ask? Because there were so many reasons why this war started. Seems it had been simmering for many years before it actually took place. Two countries would have a conflict, they would have a conference, straightening it all out, and two more countries would be in a dispute over something totally different. Europe was pretty much at each others throats from 1871 until the war started in 1914.

Dangers of war constantly increased as the political, social and economic tensions carried the seeds, leading to the adoption by the nations of Europe of domestic measures and foreign polices. During the years of 1913 and 1914 almost all the nations of Europe spent great sums preparing for war.

The major most immediate cause of the war was the assassination of the Austrian Archduke, Francis Ferdinand, heir-presumptive to the throne of Austria-Hungary. Austro-Hungarian relations with Serbia were already strained and when the assassination occurred, Austria-Hungary blamed the Greater Serbian movement and they thought the only way to stop them from disrupting the Austro-Hungarian Empire was to suppress the movement. So they sent Serbia and ultimatum with ten different demands. At the urging of Great Britain and Russia, the Serbian government agreed to all but two. Austria-Hungary declared the Serbian reply unsatisfactory. Russia threatened Austria with mobilizing against them if they marched against Serbia. Germany rejected a proposal submitted on July 26th by Sir Edward Grey, the British foreign minister that a conference of Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy be held to settle the dispute between Austria and Serbia.

Either Austria didn't believe Russia would mobilize against them or they were prepared to take the chance in order to suppress the Greater Serbian movement, because on July 28th Austria declare war on Serbia. This led to a chain of events. Russia retaliated by partially mobilizing against Austria and Germany threatened war against Russia if they didn't demobilize. But even though Austria agreed to discuss a possible modification of the demands to Serbia, Russia refused to disband. On August 1st Germany declared war on Russia.

On the same day, France began to mobilize, and on August 2nd German troops crossed Luxemburg and declared war on France August 3rd. But on August 2nd the German government informed Beligum that they planned to march through their country in order to attack France. Belgium refused to permit their passage, counting on signatories of the 1839 treaty that guaranteed them neutrality in case of a dispute between France, Great Britain, and Germany. On August 4th Great Britain issued an ultimatium to Germany for them to respect Belgium's neutrality. Germany refused and declared war on Belgium the same day.

The war progressed and other countries were drawn into the conflict. Japan, in alliance with Great Britain since 1902, declared war on Germany on August 23rd. The Pact of London, signed by France, Russia and Great Britain in September of 1914 made the Allied unity stronger. Until May 23, 1915 Italy had remained neutral, but to satisfy claims against Austria they declared war against Austria, breaking with the Triple Alliance. The United States joined in the fight on April 6, 1917 by declaring war on Germany.

Here are some dates you may need to know about the crisises foreshadowing the war.

Between 1871 and 1912:

Germany kept increasing its military forces because of the urging of its land-owning and industrial classes. The British navy stood superior to all the others. And Germany determined to create a navy greater than that of the British.

1871-1914:

The European nations valued themselves as racial entities and felt their national interests, ethnic, political and economic were being threatened, sustained large standing armies, also increasing the size of its navies.

1879:

Germany and Russia both raised tariff barriers toexclude the commodities of the other while at the same time demanding to sell them in the other country.

1882:

Italy joined with Austria and Germany in a Triple Alliance.

1891:

Russia and France joined in a Dual Alliance.

1895-1902:

Great Britain and France were hostile because of a rivalry dispute in Africa.

1899-1907:

The statesmen everywhere knew that the expense that the nations had elaborately spent on their military would eventually cause national bankruptcy or war. They took several steps for world-wide disarmament. The main effort was made through the Hague Conferences. However international rivalry had advanced too far. To them it made good sense that while their neighbor was armed to arm themselves as well. The nations thought that the knowledge of all knowing that the other was armed was within itself assurance that no nation would actually resort to war. (Sounds a little like today, doesn't it?)

1900-1902:

Because of their dispute with France, and because France was allied with Russia, Great Britain tried to come to an understanding with Germany, but failed.

1904:

Germany and Russia signed a ten-year reciprocity agreement.

1905:

Though bound by no formal treaty, Great Britain, Russia and France acted generally as a group in diplomatic matters, becoming known as the Triple Entente.

1905:

Germany stepped in to support Moroccan independence against France.

1906:

France threatened war against Germany but the crisis was settled by an international conference.

1907:

Russia and Great Britain came to an understanding over their conflicting economic rights in Tibet, Afghanistan and Persia which increased the Triple Alliance's solidarity.

1908:

The annexation by Austria-Hungary over Bosnia and Herzegovina was the second crisis. The Greater Serbian movement in Serbia--one of its objects the acquisition of by Serbia of the southern part of Bosnia. The only reason war was avoided was because Serbia couldn't fight without the help of Russia and Russia was unprepared for war.

1911:

The third crisis, also in Morocco--a warship was sent to Agadir by Germany, protesting French efforts to secure paramountcy in Morocco. The matter was adjusted in Agadir even though threats of war sprouted from both sides.

1911:

Italy declared war on Turkey, taking advantage of the preoccupation of the Great Powers over Morocco. Since Germany's policy was to cultivate friendship with Turkey, Italy's attack weakened the Triple Alliance, encouraging its enemies.

1914:

Germany and Russia's agreement was up for renewal or modification but Germany feared that Russia, whose army had grown in size would insist on terms Germany wasn't willing to grant.

1914:

The assassination of the Archduke Francis Ferdinand, leading Austria to declare war on Serbia. Germany declared war on Russia, then France and Belgium. Great Britain declared war on Germany. Japan declared war on Germany.

1915:

Italy declared war on Austria.

1917:

The United States declared war on Germany.

Well, mates, in my opinion, what it boils down to are all these nations because of jealousy, and rivalry for economic, social and political power spent huge sums of money to arm themselves to the hilt for protection against their neighbors who were also arming themselves. They thought it made great sense that if everyone owned powerful weapons that no one would declare war but they were wrong.

That's familiar of today with all the Great Powers of the world generating nuclear weapons, thinking no one would be the first to push the button, thereby destroying themselves in the process. Let's hope this time the powers that be are right.

Research material used: Universal Standard Encyclopedia, volume 25, copyright 1954 and 1955 by Wilfred Funk, Inc.

Wartime Communication from 1914-1918

I keep asking myself how people communicated or learned of what was happening on the war front in the early 1900s (1914-1918) when there wasn't television or radio.

Television wasn't invented until the 1920s. In 1923 Vladimir Zevorykin (Russian but in the United States at the time) applied for electronic patent--invented the iconoscope and the electronic camera pickup tube. So television wasn't a resource to civilians until long after the war had ended.

Radio

The first regular radio station wasn't established until 1920 although Lee De Forest (1906), an American engineer (called "father of radio"), invented the three-element vacuum tube or triode. It enabled broadcast signals, such as voice or music to be detected and amplified by a radio receiver. Also Edwin H. Armstrong, another pioneer in the development of radio, an electrical engineer and inventor devised the basic circuitry used in radio receivers and later introduced the frequency modulation (FM, system of static-free radio). Now there's more than 10,000 radio stations in the United Stated, but still radio wasn't an immediate resource for civilians during the First World War.

So what do we have left? Letters, telegraph, telephone and newspapers were the only possible means of communication during this time.

Letters from home kept the soldiers apprised of what happened back home, but did their letters inform the civilians of what took place on the battleground. Somewhat maybe they did. Letters could take months to get to loved ones. The next few sentences are only speculation on my part and from reading some correspondence between a World War II soldier and his family posted online in "Private Art." The actions of soldiers wouldn't be much different during this earlier war. I think on the most part, soldiers wouldn't tell their loved ones everything. They wouldn't want them to worry about their welfare. The only letter I read on the "Private Art Homepage" only mentioned one thing about the fighting, and that was the destruction he found when he first arrived in France. So where does that leave the civilians? How did they know what was happening?

The Wireless Telegraph

An instrument for sending and receiving code signals through space by means of electromagnetic (or radio) waves. Guglielmo Marcoroni, an Italian scientist in 1896 perfected the wireless telegraph. This enabled transmission from ship to ship, ship to shore and transoceanic communication without the use of cables. In 1902 an American physicist, Reginald A Fessenden showed that voice messages could also be broadcasted via radio waves. Another opinion here: However this still didn't give civilians knowledge of war activities or enable communication with loved ones unless it was a dire emergency. This device more than likely was saved for the delivery commands to troops and from spies to their officers on what enemy movements took place.

Telephone

Although the first telephone was publicly exhibited for the fist time at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876, world wide telephone service didn't become a reality until the second half of the 20th century. So this wasn't much help to civilians either.

Newspapers and Journalist

In my opinion this was the place where civilians got the most information. Journalist were sent to rub elbows with the troops, to learn all they could about the war and the condition in order to inform Americans of the wins and loses as well as the destruction of Europe. Ernest Hemingway I thought was one of those journalist, but I was wrong. Hemingway was a correspondent in other wars after this period and it seems some of his stories and books were written about war times.

Here's a little information on Hemingway. 1917 - Graduates high school; reporter for the Kansas City Star. 1918 - World War I ambulance driver for the American Red Cross; wounded on July 8 on the Italian front near Fossalta di Piave; had an affair with nurse Agnes von Kurowsky 1920 - reporter for Toronto Star 1921 - married to Hadley Richardson; moves to Paris, France on Sherwood Anderson's advice 1922 - correspondent for Toronto Star covering Greco-Turkish War 1923 - Three Stories and Ten Poems published by Robert McAlmon in Paris; birth of son John. I'm not saying that in 1917 he wasn't a correspondent for the Kansas City Star, but if he was there was no mention of it.

Journalist

One journalist who wrote articles about the war lived in Mansfield, Missouri. Her name was Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the famous "Little House" books. Like many other Americans, she felt a strong sense of moral outrage about the war, particularly against Germany who was guilty of many moral wrongs in the eyes of Laura. Then when America declared war, war took precedence over farm work which was the articles she usually wrote. Her articles were Published in the Missouri Ruralist. She talks about the war and its effects on farmers, Mansfield, America and the world.

Titles of the articles she wrote were: Victory May Depend on You (February 20, 1918), What the War Means to Women (May 5, 1918), How About the Home Front? (May 20,1918), Are you Helping or Hindering? (July 5, 1918), Keep the Saving Habit (March 20, 1919), Who'll Do the Women's Work? (April 5, 1919). So where did Laura get her information? Probably from other newspapers and journalist. She wrote about how the war affected us and what we could do to help as American Citizens. Her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane was also a journalist during this period.

Rose accepted a job at the San Francisco Bulletin in January, 1915, working on their recently created women's page. She wrote serial stories and fluff columns for the Bulletin When Fremont Older, editor challenged her to do better, Rose's occupation as a serious reporter and writer began.

Between 1915 and the 1940s Rose sold many stories and articles to major magazines such as: Sunset, Ladies Home Journal, Harper's Monthly, Asia, Country Gentleman, and Saturday Evening Post.

It wasn't until after the war, she traveled to France, working for the American Red Cross. Rose reported and wrote about the conditions in war-tattered countries.

But overall, these ladies weren't war correspondents. I found one man who was, Randolph Bourne 1886-1918. Here are some of his quotes about the war.

"We of the middle classes will be progressively poorer than we should otherwise have been. Our lives will be slowly drained by clumsily levied taxes and the robberies of imperfectly controlled private enterprises. But this will not cause us to revolt. There are not likely to be enough hungry stomachs to make a revolution. The materials seem generally absent from the country, and as long as a government wants to use the war-technique in its realization of great ideas, it can count serenely on the human resources of the country, regardless of popular mandate or understanding... We are learning that war doesn't need enthusiasm, doesn't need conviction, doesn't need hope, to sustain it. Once maneuvered, it takes care of itself, provided only that our industrial rulers see that the end of the war will leave American capital in a strategic position for world-enterprise." A War Diary, The Seven Arts, Sept. 1917

"Country is a concept of peace, of tolerance, of living and letting live. But State is essentially a concept of power, of competition; it signifies a group in its aggressive aspects. And we have the misfortune of being born not only into a country but into a State, and as we grow up we learn to mingle the two feelings into a hopeless confusion..."

and--

War is the health of the State. It automatically sets in motion throughout society those irresistible forces for uniformity, for passionate cooperation with the Government in coercing into obedience the minority groups and individuals which lack the larger herd sense...the nation in war-time attains a uniformity of feeling, a hierarchy of values culminating at the undisputed apex of the State ideal, which could not possibly be produced through any other agency than war... The State is intimately connected with war, for it is the organization of the collective community when it acts in a political manner, and to act in a political manner towards a rival group has meant, throughout all history - war...

The last two paragraphs are a couple of quotations from the first draft of an essay, "The State", left unfinished by Bourne at the time of his death. The quotations can now be found in the Bourne MSS, Columbia University Libraries.

Sources:

Online Sources

Letters:

Private Art, http://www.private-art.com - Letters of WW2 soldier

Telephone, Telegraph & Radio Sources:

Rural Telephone Co-ops, http://www.ncb.com/day/a10a.htm

Early Telephone Companies, http://www.cobleskill.edu/schools/mcs/csbest/phone2.htm

Alexander Graham Bell's Path to the Telephone http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/albell/introduction.html

History of Telecommunications from 1874-1930 http://www-stall.rz.fht-esslingen.de/telehistory/1870-.htm

A History of the Telephone http://www.geog.buffalo.edu/Geo666/flammger/tele2.html

Television:

Television History http://jcomm.uoregon.edu/~robinson/j201/Tv.html

Writers and Journalist:

Ernest Hemingway http://rio.atlantic.net/~gagne/hem/hemlinks.html

Ernest Hemingway's Timeline http://rio.atlantic.net/~gagne/hem/time.html

Rose Wilder Lane http://webpages.marshall.edu/~irby7/rose.html

Randolph Bourne 1886-1918 http://www.bigeye.com/rbourne.htm

Randolph Bourne Quotations http://www.bigeye.com/rbquotes.htm

Book Sources:

"I Remember Laura - Laura Ingalls Wilder," by Stephen W. Hines, copyright 1994 by Stephen W. Hines

"A Ghost In The Little House," by William Hotz, copyright 1993 by The Curators of the University of Missouri

"US History Review Text," by Paul M. Roberts, copyright 1998, 1996, 1993, 1989 by Amsco School Publications, Inc.

Warbirds

Fighter Planes of WWI

Performance vs. Appearance

The planes of the WWI era, often its appearance didn't fit its performance. One example is the British S.E.5a. This aircraft was awkward looking, boxy; yet it was rugged and fast, one of the best fighter planes of the war.

France's Nieuport 28 in comparison was a good-looking and sleek plane, sleek and pleasing to the eye. By appearance it seemed a good plane but in truth it was unreliable. During steep dives, the Nieuport 28s tended to shed their wing fabric. This is only one of the aircraft's problems.

On the other hand, some of the plane's appearances and potential matched excellently. A perfect example of this is the Austro-Hungarian Hansa-Bradenburg D.I. Pilots nicknamed the plane "coffin." It flew like it looked, freaky.

Aircraft Engines

Hurting badly in 1918, Germany's air force hadn't been ahead in air fights since Spring of 1917. They lacked premium engines. The Allies used Hispano-Suiza, a 200hp V-8 verses the German's 160hp Mercedes. Finally the Germans received the improved engine they awaited in the Spring of 1918, the 185hp straight-6 BMW. The success of Fokker D.VII. could be credited to this powerful engine, although it proved too little, too late.

The Immelmann Maneuver

Many think Max Immelmann constructed the "Immelmann Turn", although the link between the aerial maneuver and the German may have been instituted by a journalist. Wherever it came from, during WWI, pilots used it to either attack or get out of the way of an attack.

The Immelmann Turn started with a dive to get the thrust to carry them to the next step. The pilot then yanked abruptly on the joystick to boot the plane into a precipitous arcing ascend with a roll. This guaranteed the plane, when it reached the top of the loop would be right-side-up.

Once the pilot achieved the turn, he had two options. He could escape a fight by enjoying his height prevalence, continuing to fly straight or dive and follow the loop through while rolling.

Once a pilot found an enemy fighter on his tail, the pilot of the front plane could shake off his attacker by doing the Immelmann maneuver. On the other hand, if the pursuing pilot dived on a target, overshooting it, his next action would be to use the Immelmann turn to give himself another shot.

Brief Survey of Military Aviation (Overview)

Three major roles were defined for aircraft during the First World War: reconnaissance, bombing and fighting. Airplanes were used first for aerial scouts--spying on the enemy from the air and learning their secrets. At first the scouts ignored their enemy numbers, then began shooting at them with rifles and eventually with machine guns. Soon they began dropping hand grenades from their planes. Promptly an aircraft was designed for each need: reconnaissance planes some armed for defense; fighter planes, exclusively designed for shooting down other planes; and bombers carried more immense loads of explosives. Much of what we know and learn today about warbirds came from the fundamental experiences of the pilots of the First World War.

Aircraft Beginnings

Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first powered, controlled flight in 1903. After that, the military acclaimed the possibilities of airplanes and the US Army bought their Model A biplane for $30,000 in 1909.

Observation balloon's importance was already confirmed and the airplanes frankly appeared more maneuverable as observation platforms. The first experiments of dropping dummy bombs were accomplished in 1910 and a patent was granted for an aircraft gun mount that same year. In 1911 hand grenades were dropped from airplanes and pistol shots were fired from one plane to another in 1913. These were only isolated events that happened during peacetime, as research, I suppose.

Prior to the First World War records of speed and endurance were broken rapidly. With each passing year they grew greater.

Aircraft of WWI

All the combatants sent reconnaissance airplanes out to watch each others troops movements and detected their artillery at the beginning of World War I. The pilots on each side would in fact fly by each other and wave. They felt they were fellow aviators and above the combat taking place below their wings. Of course this camaraderie did not last.

It's unknown as to who fired the first shots, but soon these scouts carried rifles in their planes. A French scout shot down a German scout with a machine gun that had been mounted to his observer's station on October 14, 1914. Then a new class of plane came into existence, the fighter warplane.

The first strategic bombing raid was instituted in November of 1914 against Zeppelin hangers. The dropping of hand grenades over the side hastily changed to dropping hundreds, then thousands of pounds of explosives from the bomb bays and wing racks.

During WWI, the race between nations for the first and best technology began. The Allies held the record for a time when Roland Garros equipped reflection plates to the propeller of his Morane-Saulnier which enabled him to fire a machine gun through its arc. Though the Germans then developed a system of synchronizing machine guns to fire rhythmically through the arc. The Allies followed suit by fashioning their own synchronize, fitting it onto aircraft such as the S.E.5, Sopwith Camel, and SPAD. Then Germans' planes were the Fokker Dr. 1, the Fokker DVII and the Albatros.

Aircraft in WWI showed what could happen, although air power proved inconsequential and had no real affect on the outcome of the war. They could spy movements of soldiers on the ground and attack bombers could make life deplorable for ground troops. Terror was brought to civilians by heavy bombers. The design and technology of airplanes leapt ahead during the war and laid the foundation for the aerial armadas of the Second World War.

The Greatest WWI Warbirds

R.A.F. S.E.5a (Britain)

This aircraft confirmed to be the better fighter plane than the more heavily armed German fighters of that time. It's single wing-mounted machine gun could be swiveled upward by the pilot, enabling it ideal for shooting downward at the surprised aircraft beneath it. With its top speed of 138 mph it could climb as high as 19,500 feet and dive magnificently. The S.E.5a was one of the fastest fighters during WWI.

A 1917 plane, single-engine biplane fighter, manufactured by the Royal Aircraft Factory in Britain. Engine, one 200hp Wolseley W4 Viper liquid--cooled eight cylinder in-line V. It's range/endurance was two hours and thirty minutes. It had a wingspan of twenty-six feet, seven inches; length of twenty feet, eleven inches and weighed one-thousand, nine-hundred and forty pounds.

Nieuport 17 (France)

The successor of the Nieuport 11 "Bebe", the Nieuport 17 was bigger, heavier, better-armed and faster, a swift climber. It was favored by the most famous aces of WWI, Navarre, Fonck, Guynemer, Nungesser, Bishop and Ball. Flying of this machine, required caution and experience because of its tendency to shed its wings during a step dive. The arrival of the SPAD eclipsed the Nieuport 17's popularity.

In 1916, the Nieuport 17 was a single-engine biplane fighter with an engine of one 110-hp Le Rhone air-cooled rotary, speeds reaching 110 mph at 6,560 ft. Its range/endurance was two hours. It was armed with one machine gun; carried a crew of one; and had a wingspan of twenty-six feet, ten inches; a length of eighteen feet, eleven inches and weighed one-thousand, two-hundred and forty-six pounds.

Sopwith Camel F.1 (Britain)

It got its nickname from the hump-like fairing that covered its twin machine guns. In trained hands the Camel was deadly in aerial combat although it was arduous to fly. Its rotary engines were powerful and full of torque. This was the first British plane to carry twin machine guns that was belt-fed, eliminating the need for changing magazines. The Camel proved remarkably maneuverable. Manfred von Richthfen's Fokker Triplane was shot down by Captain Roy Brown, flying a Camel.

In 1917, the Sopwith Camel F.1 was a single-engine biplane fighter, manufactured by Sopwith Aviation Co., Ltd. in Britain.

It had one 130-hp Clerget air-colled 9-cylinder rotary engine which allowed speeds of 115 mph at 6,500 feet. The Camel's range/endurance was two hours and thirty minutes. It carried two machine gun and a crew of one. The wingspan spread to twenty-eight feet with a length of eighteen feet, nine inches and a weight of one-thousand four-hundred and fifty-three pounds.

SPAD S.XIII (France)

Probably the most famous fighter of WWI, the SPAD is associated by most American minds with Eddie Rickenbacker and the "Hat in the Ring" squadron, though many French aces also loved and flew the SPAD. It had a high velocity of climb and the stamina of its construction that enabled it to dive steeply without loosing its wings.(Most biplanes would fold and plummet to the ground if they were dove too fast and steep.) The plane was fast for its day and didn't handle well under low speeds, requiring it to be landed under power and it dropped like a brick if its engine switched off."

In 1917, a single-engine biplane fighter that was manufactured by S.P.A.D. (Sociere Anonyme Pour l'Aviation et ses Derives) in France. It's engine was one 235-hp Hispano-Suiza liquid-cooled 8-cylinder in-line V with speeds of 119 mph and a range/endurance of two hours. The SPAD carried one crew member and two machine guns. The wingspan spread to twenty-six feet and eleven inches with its length being twenty feet and eight inches. It weighed one-thousand, eight-hundred and one pounds.

Fokker D.VII (Germany)

The Fokker D. VII, unremarkable in appearance and the best-performing, best all-around German fighter during the First World War. It had sturdiness, maneuverability, good speed, extraordinary rate of climb and its performance at high-altitudes was remarkable. Hanging on its propeller at a forty-five degree angle, it was still fully flyable, enabling it to shoot upward into an enemy's belly. The plane was tolerant of beginner's mistakes and was respected by its adversaries. Evidence of this came at the end of the war when the victorious Allies named it in the terms of the Armistice as a war weapon that had to be handed over.

In 1918, a single-engine biplane fighter, manufactured by Fokker Flugzeug-Werke GmbH in Germany. It had a wingspan of twenty-nine feet, three inches; a length of nine feet, two inches and weighed one-thousand, eight-hundred and seventy pounds. Carrying a crew of one with a range/endurance of one hour and thirty minutes, it had two machine guns. The engine was one 160-hp Mercedes D III liquid-cooled in-line 6 cylinder.

Fokker Dr.1 Triplane (Germany)

With only three wings but an airfoil between the wheels of its landing gear, the Dr.1's lifting area allowed it to climb and out-turn any Allied aircraft. The plane wasn't very fast but its superior maneuverability allowed it to evade pursuit. There was only one way it could be outdone and that was by its opponent diving on it and striking before the pilot had time to take evasive action. The Red Baron, Manfred von Richthofen popularized the Dr.1. The Dr.1 is second only to the Fokker D. VII as the best remembered German plane of WWI.

The Dr.1, in 1917 had a wingspan of twenty-three feet, seven inch; a length of eighteen feet, eleven inches and weighed one- thousand two-hundred eighty-nine pounds. It was a single-engine fighter triplane manufactured in Germany by Fokker Flugzeug-Serke GmbH. The engine, one 110-hp Thulin-built Le Rhone 9J air-cooled 9-cylinder rotary with a speed of 103 mph at 13,123 feet. Its range/endurance was one hour and thirty minutes. The Dr.1 carried one crew member and two machine guns.

List of Films Featuring WWI Warbirds

Ace of Aces

The Dawn Patrol

The Great Waldo Pepper

Layfayette Escadrille

The Trial of Billy Mitchell

The Blue Max

Hell's Angels

Wings

Recommended Reading of Warbirds

Angelucci, Enzo. "The Rand McNally Encyclopedia of Military Aircraft"

Bonds, Ray. "The Illustrated Directory of Modern Weapons: Warplanes, tanks, missiles, warships, artillery, small arms." Crescent Books, 1985.

Cole, Dick Major; Lightbody, Andy; Poyer, Joe. "The Great Book of Fighter Planes: The Worlds Warbirds" Publications International, 1990

Cross, Roy. "Great Aircraft and their Pilots" New York Graphic Society, 1971.

Dwights, Don. "Famous Flyers and the Ships They Flew" Grossett & Dunlap, Inc., 1969.

That's just a few.

Sources:

"Planes", http://www2.eos.net/speed/homepage.htm

"Warbirds Arts and Letter" CD Rom

World War II

World War II American Fashion

A 1944 magazine ad for Tangee lipstick read that, to a degree, " . . . we're still the weaker sex . . . It's up to us to appear as alluring and lovely as possible . . . Whether you're in or out of uniform, you'll want to be completely appealing and feminine - you'll want delightful satin-smooth lips and all the glamour of a silky, petal-smooth complexion."

Looking good was essential for stateside women during the Second World War. In early 1940, marketing stressed the importance of women's appearance and their obligation of bringing beauty into family life. The ongoing theme 'beauty is duty' prevailed.

The war, bringing on many civilian shortages, substitution became a way of life stateside, affecting daily life. Even though, powder, eye makeup and lipsticks were considered necessary for persevering wartime spirits, some ingredients were no longer available. Eighteen line of goods affecting style were in short supply, from castor oil and zinc to acetone.

One of these items, zinc oxide used in face powder was also needed in large quantities in tire plants. The soldiers needed tires for their jeeps, thereby forcing beauty suppliers to search for substitutions. The talc in face powder was imported from Italy and since we were at war with Italy, they shipped no more. The substitution for talc came from India and Manchuria which were countries thousands of miles away. Shipment was scarce. India was also a primary origin for titanium and titanium dioxide can replace zinc oxide which was also being seized by the paint and paper companies who used it for a zinc substitute.

Gums in the goo for women's hair setting lotion and henna in most hair tints and dyes, instituted in the Near East. Nail polish, nail polish removers and hair-waving lotions all consisted of substantial industrial chemical ingredients. Shipments could not be depended on and all the above were in short supply.

Military and civilian provisions included the same manpower, facilities and fibers. The government wanted to conserve materials to prevent shortages and also keep morale up, without harming standing industries. The War Production Board of the federal government established a series of regulations constituting many industries including cosmetics, lingerie and apparel. Private citizens had to adjust any new clothing to the conditions with very few exceptions.

Anything using vast amounts of cloth or thought unnecessary were not allowed, such as: Dolman, balloon and leg-of-mutton sleeves, aprons, overskirts, decorative trim, patch pockets and petticoats.

Men's suits consisted of two-piece suits--a jacket and pants without cuffs, although before 1942 they consisted of four pieces--two pairs of pants, a vest and a double-breasted jacket. This is where our sense of matching and mixing was established.

Source:

Research at the Smithsonian, Costume specialists seek threads of World War II clothing history, by Vicki Moeser, Smithsonian Office of Public Affairs
http://www.si.edu/resource/topics/ww2cloth.htm

Coding and Decoding:

A Way of Communication During WWII

Two things made the German Military a success during WWII, and that was organization and communication. "Blitzkrieg" allowed them victory after victory in Europe. This operation employed tanks (panzers) and dive bombers (Stukas). They cut off England's supply line at sea with a well-aimed submarine "wolf pack" assaults on fleets.

The Germans used an electro-mechanical device; Enigma to encode information which assured the adversary would not seize critical data. They believed that even if the machine was captured by their enemy, it would be useless to them. Both receiver and sender had to have the same key, describing how the message was encoded.

The Enigma machine resembles a typewriter, but with rows of lights in the middle and three thumbwheels in the back. A project called Ultra which was a focused attempt to break the enciphered messages, and was the Allies greatest secret. The Poles begun this project, then the British continued it and later was supported by the Americans.

Messages sent to their various units had different keys. Messages meant for the Navy (Kriegsmarine) were not readable by the Air Force (Luftwaffe). Communication could be directed to the appropriate unit by assigning different keys to different units.

Three reasons for using codes for message transference was to hide the meaning of the message, in case the transference medium can't carry voice (telegraphs can only transmit dashes and dots), and to make transmissions more efficient.

Encipherment, in which letters in plain text messages are represented by letters or characters according to some scheme and coding, in which words or phrases are represented by symbols were the two methods of preparing a message for transmission. Cryptology is a two-part science of making and breaking enciphered information. Cryptography is encoding. Cryptanalysis is the breaking of codes. Superencipherment is when the message is first coded, then enciphered. This makes the code twice as hard to break.

Codes are words made into numbers and usually kept on a list or book of phrases. Such as:

1006 rendezvous
1005 location
1004 ammunition
1003 attack
1002 will
1001 coast

"Attack coast location" would be 1003 1001 1005. This type of message is extremely complex if the code groups aren't arranged alphabetically as you can see my example was not. This system was used by both sides during WWI. To use this type of system, every group needed a code-book and if the book was captured, the enemy could decipher the messages. During WWI, in 1914, the German warship, Magdeburg grounded in the Baltic and because of errors, the Russians were able to salvage the code-book and the German's didn't know the codes were no longer secure; therefore, they continued to use them.

Mono-alphabetic substitution was the simplest of all ciphers. A second alphabet is randomly written out under the original alphabet.

Example:

abcdefg . . . z
LHNTBER . . .

Rotating cylinders and mechanical ciphering rings have been used since ancient civilization. A ciphering devise consisting of a number of rings on a common shaft was invented by Thomas Jefferson. Three men simultaneously invented the first electro-mechanical rotor device. Edward Hugh Hebern from the US was first in 1918 and was used by the Americans in the second world war. Hugo Alexander Kock from the Netherlands in 1919 invented his own machine and Arvid Gerhard Damm from Sweden in 1919 came up with another version.

The Poles kept their eye on Germany, their neighbor during the period between the world wars. The Enigma codes were broke by a team, comprising of Henryk Zygalski, Jerzy Rozycki and Marian Rejewski. By the end of the war thousand of people, anyone with high tech computers were decoding Axis messages. And it could have never been accomplished without the pioneering efforts of these three men.

Germany's naval messages abruptly underwent excessive major changes in 1926 and the Poles could no longer decipher them. By 1928, Army transmissions followed their lead. They learned by espionage that the Germans had begun to machine encode their messages.

Hans Thilo-Schmidt persuaded his brother, a Lieutenant Colonel to give him a job and part of that job was to destroy invalid Enigma codes. This granted him access to information he sold to the French. He equipped Gustave Bertrand, French Intelligence with a booklet containing the Enigma machine's setup procedures. Only two things were missing from the book and this was the rotor wiring and information on the keys.

The French and the British agreed that the information was insufficient and could not be used. Bertrand offered it to Rejewski in Poland. He was happy to receive the booklet. Then Schmidt obtained some outdated Enigma keys which Rejewski had requested from Bertrand, and they were sent back to Poland.

The Poles had the keys used to convert plain text to code, messages in code and messages in plain text. Eventually they were able to make a duplicate Enigma machine, based on a commercial copy with the rotors rewired. They set up the machine according to the codes, but their first try at encoding came up as gibberish. They rechecked their equations numerous times until Rejewski was almost ready to give up. Then he wondered if the wiring from the keyboard to the scrambler was A to B, B to B, etc. instead of like the commercial model's Q to A, W to B, (keyboard order). After rewiring, another test was ran and they succeeded with plain text. This was 1933 and their Enigma replica was functional.

However, this was only half the battle. It was still useless without the keys. A fragment of plain text in order to correspond to a section of code of the same length is a "crib." The Poles were furnished with cribs unknowingly by the Germans. Most of their messages started with "anx" (an means to in German and x is a word separator).

It took the Poles a year to construct a card catalog of each of the possible positions. By November 1, 1937 the card catalog was useless because the Germans changed the umkherwalze wiring and it took the Poles less than a year to finish another card catalog, which the Germans changed their method of enciphering the keys, rendering the card catalog useless again.

There were many complications in breaking the Enigma machine codes. The Germans added two new rotors; making five available on December 15, 1938, but only three were used at any one time. Knowing that their country was about to be invaded by the Germans, the Poles shared their information with the French and the British. The British tried to break the codes but the Germans had added complications, making a break impossible. The Poles gave the British their complete solution of German codes, their Enigma copy and bomby (a machine that tried different cycles of codes, made a ticking noise as they worked and stopped when they arrived at a solution) to the British on July 25, 1939.

Four days after Hitler invaded Poland; the code breakers packed up their equipment and left for France, although they had to destroy their equipment on the way. They continued their work in France and shared with the British, using their equipment.

How was the Enigma codes ever ciphered? The codes could have been unbreakable with the methods available at that time. That is if the machine had been used correctly. The Germans believed the Enigma invincible and that was their biggest mistake. Occasional operator laziness combined with procedural errors allowed the Poles, then the British to break the invincible codes. Each army unit used two Enigma operators. One worked the machine while the other wrote down the lit-up letters on the lamp board. These men weren't always properly trained how to use the machine and picked their own message keys, often making poor choices.

However in the navy, only officers were able to set up the machines, making them more secure. Sub-codes were carefully chosen, minimizing any possibility of a code breaker deducing it. The code lists that were printed with water-soluble ink were always kept under lock and key. These precautions proved to be very effective and the Allies didn't crack the naval codes until two years after they did the army's.

Sources:

The Enigma Exhibit--Museum of National Security
http://www.nsa.gov.8080/museum/enigma.html

The Alan Turing Internet Scrapbook--Critical Cryptology: The Second World War
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~wadh0249/scrp2.html

The Enigma Machine--Museum of Science and Industry
http://www.msichicago.org/exhibit/u505/ENIGMA.html

How The Poles Broke The Enigma Code Prior to WWII 1926-1939
http://members.aol.com/nbrass/1enigma.htm

Code breaking and Secret Weapons in WWII
http://members.aol.com/nbrass/enigma.htm

German Enigma Cipher Machine/History of Solving
http://www.gl.umbc.edu/~lmazia1/Enigma/text.html

VE-Day "Victory-in-Euorpe Day"

Victory-in-Europe Day (V-E Day) was a celebration of the end of war in Europe. On May 8, 1945 V-E Day was proclaimed and celebrated in Western Europe, Britain and the United States, and in the Soviet Union the following day. There was dancing in the streets and fireworks. Newspaper photographs showed the jubilation exhilarated by the relief from war time sorrows, hardships and privations.

Although for many civilians and soldiers that were injured or had died, the war ended much earlier, V-E Day was the focal point of memory and celebrations.

In Normandy and Northern France liberation had begun with D-day, the end of spring the year before from June, 1944 through July, 1944 and Paris civilians had celebrated their freedom in August.

Those freed from Auschwitz, who survived the 'death marches' were freed in April 1945 as were many prisoner-of-war camps, holding hundreds of thousands Allied soldiers, airmen and sailors. Some of these had been held captive for over five years.

The beginning of the end started by the end of March, 1945. Allied armies were on both borders, East and West. Belgium and France had already been freed though fighting continued in Northern Italy, Hungary and Yugoslavia. Remaining under German occupation were Norway, Denmark and Holland. The prospect of renewed German submarine offensives and the terrors of bombs were over, as were the threat of Hitler's secret weapons.

Fighting on German soil continued at the beginning of April. Germany winning was no longer a possibility once the American Ninth and Third armies encircled the Rhur, thereby severing Germany from its industrial heartland. This was done on April 1st when the two armies met in Lippstat--an accomplishment that shocked all Allied observers.

Once deep into Germany on April 4th, American troops found a camp like none they'd ever seen. Laying in the ground around the barracks were more than three thousand emaciated corpses. This camp, Ohrdruf was a slave labor camp.

On April 6th, in the town of Merkers, deep in a mine, American soldiers found paintings that the Germans had looted from the art galleries of Europe. Also found were paintings from Berlin's art galleries hid there for safe keeping. Other than works of art, a hundred tons of gold bars were discovered--some made from the gold fillings and gold teeth taken from the murdered Jews mouths at Auschwitz and a dozen other camps. Why didn't the Germans move the treasures before the American troops approached the mine? Because German railway workers insisted on observing Easter Sunday.

On April 11th, two more concentration camps were liberated, Nordhausen (Mittlebau-Dora factory--a vast slave labor camp)and Buchenwald. Soldiers active in this liberation saw mounds of dead bodies, piled high and naked. They vomited from the sight and the stench.

The death of President Franklin D. Rossevelt on April 12th gave the Germans a ray of hope that his successor, Harry Truman would settle for an armistice. Millions of Americans had wept when they heard of their Presiden's death, and American soldiers were troubled by the loss of their Commander-in-Chief. But nothing would weaken the resolve to see the battle through to an unconditional surrender from the Nazis. This had been Roosevelt's demand to which Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin had endorsed. This remained the Allies aim.

On April 15th, British soldiers came upon the first of the largest concentration camps. Belsen is where tens of thousand of Jews were brought from the slave labor camps of eastern Europe where they were left to starve and to rot with almost no food or medical help. At Belsen, they had no work for them to do. So why were they brought here you might ask? So they wouldn't fall into the hands of the Russians. The soldiers felt an outrage from what they found. Here, they didn't have gas chambers, but the victims were left to die of starvation and disease.

When the British tank rolled into the camp of Belsen, he opened the door and yelled into a bull horn the sweetest words the prisoners would ever hear, "You are free. You are free. You are free." Though thousand lays dead because they no longer had the strength or the will to live, those that were still alive became free. This was a moment to be engraved in the memories of those behind the barbed wire with the first British tank entered.

This was a moment that transformed the Allied perception of the war. Before the liberation of Belsen, the full nature of the tyranny they'd been out to destroy had not been grasped. There was a rave of outrage as photographs and films of ten thousand unburied bodies, stacked in piles in the camp and scattered between the huts were seen. Many of the living men and women who didn't look much different from the dead. This brought anger and loathing toward the Nazis.

In the days and weeks that followed many more concentration camps were liberated. The death of Hitler on May 1st was broadcast over Hamburg Radio. Negotiations began. General Hans Krebs asked for a truce, but Stalin insisted upon an unconditional surrender. But Martin Bormann, head of the Nazi Party Chancellery and Josef Goebbels, the Nazi propaganda chief, both were determined not to give in.

On May 2, the last 40,000 Germans in Italy surrendered. On May 4, four German officers signed a document of surrender. Cease-fire was to take effect at 8 o'clock on May 5. All German forces in Holland, Denmark and northwest Germany would lay down their arms. The war was ending all over Europe.

On May 4, 446 American sailors were killed when in the Pacific, off Okinawa, seven American ships were hit by Japanese suicide aircraft.

There were many more surrenders during the span of May 5 through May 7, but at one minute past midnight on May 8, the so awaited V-E Day came.

May 8, 1945, celebrations commenced, hundreds of flags and pennants and bunting flew from most of the buildings in the center of town. Winston Churchhill and heads the minsters of the wartime coalition appeared on a balcony overlooking Whitehall while the crowds cheered. Celebration caused chaos in the streets of London. Tables full of joyous people sat in the street at an open-air street party in London. Victory parades were held throughout Europe to welcome home returning soldiers. Though for those still fighting in the Pacific, the end of the war didn't end until Victory in Japan (V-J Day) on August 15, 1945.

Source:

"The Day The War Ended: May 8, 1945" by Martin Gilbert
Copyright in 1995 by Martin Gilbert. Published by Henry Holt and Company, Inc.

Events In History

Fads and Innovations during WWII

1939: On September 1st, Germany invaded Poland, and by the 3rd of September, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany. The British passenger ship, Athenia, was sunk by the Germans, killing thirty Americans on board on September 3rd.

Due to the war in Europe, the economy surged forward. Twenty -five cents per pound was paid for coffee. Admission at movie theaters in America ranged from twenty-two cents to fifty-five cents, where Americans averaged seeing one movie per week. "Wizard of Oz" and "Gone With The Wind" played at the theaters.

The helicopter was invented. The first regularly scheduled transatlantic flight began by Pan Am with its airliner, the "Dixie Clipper."

Thirty-two million people attended the New York World's Fair, held in Flushing, Long Island from April through October. The New York Yankees won the World Series, victorious over the Cincinnati Reds.

A national fad became popular among college students. One student swallowed forty-three live goldfish.

1940: War continued as Germany occupied Norway and Denmark on April 19th. Then on May 10th, a little over a month later, Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands was invaded by Germany. Italy declared war on France and Britain on June 10th and on June 21st, France was defeated and surrendered. In August "The Battle of Britain" started. Germany attacked Great Britain by air, but aided by airborne radar, British RAF defeated the German planes two to one.

Due to increasing factory orders induced by the war, unemployment dropped as the forty hour work week was adopted nationwide.

Axis powers, a form of economic and military alliance between Germany, Italy and Japan was formed. And the first peacetime draft was conducted by the United States. The belief that marriage would defer men from service caused a speed up of engagements.

Because of the war in Europe, the Olympic games were cancelled.

The chain known today as McDonalds was opened and by Richard and Maurice McDonald in Pasadena, Californian. This was the first drive-in restaurant. M & M candy bars were also developed.

In the World Series, the Cincinnati Reds beat the Detroit Tigers. The movie star, Tom Mix died in a car crash.

1941: Germany invaded the Soviet Union on June 22nd. The U.S. destroyer, Ruben James was sunk by a German submarine. Pearl Harbor, Hawaii was attacked, sinking the California, Utah, Oklahoma and Arizona and heavily damaging others. Three thousand Americans were killed. Japan also attacked Guam, Wakes Island and the Philippines. On December 8th, the United States declared war on Japan. Then Italy and Germany declared war on the United States on December 11th. Cities throughout the United States, blackout and air raid tests were staged.

On December 27th, the rationing of rubber went into effect.

The New York Yankee's first baseman, Lou Gehrig, died at thirty-seven on June 22nd. In the World Series, the New York Yankees beat the Brooklyn Dodgers.

1942: In the Pacific, the United States suffered numerous defeats, especially in the Philippines and Manila Bay. But in May, the defeat of the Japanese in the "Battle of the Coral Sea" and again in the "Battle of Midway" in June, thereby turning the tables. Japan lost 17 ships, 275 planes and 4,800 men in Midway. Major General James Doolittle and his squadron of sixteen B-25s infiltrated Japan, bombing Tokyo and other cities on April 18th. The US morale was boosted by the attack.

The American and Japanese forces started a battle for supremacy when the Marines landed on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands on August 7th.

More rations began in the US; sugar on May 5th and gas on May 15th. National gas rationing didn't begin until December 1st.

In Boston, on November 28th the Coconut Grove nightclub fire killed 492 people.

The most decorated soldier in WWII, Audie Murphy, joined the army at the age of sixteen.

The St. Louis Cardinals won the World Series, beating the New York Yankees.

1943: Twenty-two Japanese ships were sunk and fifty Japanese planes were downed by the Americans in the "Battle of the Bismarck Sea" on May 24th. British forces captured Tunis, and the U.S. captured Tunisia on May 7th.

John F. Kennedy and ten crew members swam to safety and were marooned on an island for days after their PT boat was rammed and cut in two by a Japanese destroyer in the Solomon Islands.

In May, in the surrender of North Africa 250,000 Axis troops were taken prisoner. On July 10th, allied forces invaded Sicily and allied planes bombed Rome on July 19th. In the fight for Sicily, Axis forces lost 167,000 men. On August 17th, the allied forces were triumphant. Italy surrendered to allies on September 8th.

On December 24th, Dwight Eisenhower was appointed Supreme Commander of the Allied forces for the invasion of Europe.

Americans were limited to 3 pairs of shoes per year as of February 7th, when shoe rationing went into affect. March 17th, canned goods were rationed and on March 29th meat and cheese were rationed.

St. Louis Cardinals lost to the New York Yankees in the World Series.

1944: On January 22nd, Allied forces landed at Anzio, Italy. On March 6th, eight hundred U.S. flying fortresses bombed Berlin.

In Operation Overlord, the most massive military operation in history, Allied forces invaded Normandy, France on June 6h, D-Day, involving over five thousand ships, three thousand planes and close to four million troops.

On June 13th, Germany began to use V-1 rocket bomb and in the fall, the larger V-2s.

In the battle of Saipan, the U.S. forces were victorious and twenty-five thousand Japanese soldiers were killed. On September 24th, Lieutenant George Bush's plane is shot down by the Japanese over Chi Chi Jima, during a bombing run on the island, but he was quickly rescued by an Allied submarine. U.S. takes Guam and seventeen thousand soldier were killed on August 9th.

On August 25th, Paris was liberated. And on September 12th, U.S. forces infiltrate Germany for the first time. The Japanese adopted suicide bomber stragedy out of desperation. At the massive naval battle of Lete, Philippine Islands on October 23-26, Kamikaze pilots and their suicide dives were seen for the first time.

December 16th, Battle of the Bulge began.

Assassination attempt on Hitler failed on July 20th.

Ringlin Brothers and Barnum and Bailey circus tent in Hartford, Connecticut caught fire during a performance on July 6th and one hundred, sixty-seven people were killed and nearly five hundred injured.

In the U.S., twenty thousand cases of polio were reported. Franklin D. Roosevelt was reelected for a record fourth term as president, Harry Truman elected his vice-president.

In World Series, St. Louis Cardinals were victorious over the St. Louis Browns.

1945: From February 13th to the 14th, allied planes bomb Dresden. In the resulting firestorm, an estimated seventy thousand refugees died.

In the battle of Iwo Jima, the Japanese lost over twenty thousand men. Over one thousand were killed when two hundred seventy-nine U.S. B-29s napalm-bomb Tokyo on March 9th through 10th. On April 1st, the United States invaded Okinawa.

On April 28th, Mussolini and his mistress were killed by a firing squad and Adolph Hitler and his wife, Eva Braun committed suicide in Berlin on April 30th.

By May 3rd, British forces occupied Hamburg. On May 8th, V-E, Victory in Europe day begins. The war in Europe ended.

Before the Japanese surrendered on June 21st, one hundred thousand Japanese soldiers died at Okinawa. On July 5th, the Philippine Islands were liberated.

On July 16th, the first atomic bomb was test-detonated near Alamogordo, New Mexico. Colonel Paul Tibbets dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, in the Enola Gay on August 6th. Eighty thousand perished. On August 8th, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan. Forty thousand perished when the atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan on August 9th.

V-J, Victory in Japan, day, was established on August 15th and the War in the Pacific ended. The Japanese officially signed the surrender document on U. S. S. Missouri in Tokyo Bay on September 2nd.

A B-25 bomber crashed into the 78th and 79th floor of the Empire State Building, killing thirteen people during a blinding fog on July 28th.

Twenty-one war criminals were put on trial for various atrocities during Nuremberg war crime trials.

At the age of sixty-three, Franklin D. Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, and Harry Truman assumed the presidency.

October 30th, the shoe rationing ended. Meat and butter rationing ended on November 23rd. Tire rationing ended on December 20th.

In Atlantic City, Bess Myerson won Miss America title. And the Detroit Tigers were victorious over the Chicago Cubs in the World Series.

Source:

Information gathered from "The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life from Prohibition through World War II" by Marc McCutcheon, copyright 1995 by Marc McCutcheon.

German U-Boats of WWII

Each country in the war had an area which they excelled, and for the Germans that was the powerful U-boats with cannons, big guns and torpedos, sailing the Atlantic. There were many operations for U-boats during WWII. First we'll discuss the Larconia incident.

Larconia Incident

A German U-boat (U-156) torpedoed a large target in the South Atlantic Ocean. A British liner (Larconia), carrying a 136-man crew, military material and personnel (268 men), about 80 civilians, and around 1800 Italian prisoners of war along with armed guards of 160 Polish soldiers sank at 2323 hours military time.

Amazed to hear Italian voices, the commander, Kptlt. Werner Harenstien at once began a rescue mission for the people struggling in the sea and those in lifeboats. Offering to cease hostilities, he radioed an uncoded message to every vessel within hearing distance for help.

In the days that followed Harenstien's crew save about 400 survivors, half of which were brought on ship and the other half in lifeboats. Next U-506 arrived and began to help rescue the survivors and a little while later U-507 and an Italian submarine came to help. As the boats headed for shore, towing the lifeboats behind them, an American B-24 Liberator bomber operating from the Ascension Island, its pilot spotted the boats.

The pilot radioed base asking for instructions. Following orders he attacked, forcing the rescue boats to cut the lines leading to the lifeboats, leaving hundreds of survivors in the water again.

Because a French warship from Dakar appeared and began fishing people out of the water again, the US attack didn't cause as many dead as it could have. Approximately 1500 people survived.

Many times U-boats had helped their survivors with supplies, water and directions of which way to go. After this incident, an order was issued (called the Larconia order) that no U-boats were ever to take part in rescue operations again. They were to leave their survivors in the sea.

Operation Drumbeat: War against America

Hitler was bound by a promise to Japan to declare war on the US and after the Japanese's attack on Pearl Harbor December 7th, 1941, he did on December 11th. All restrictions on German U-boats not to attack American shipping were removed. Donitz immediately drew up plans to devastate the US eastern seaboard with swift blows.

The only boats capable of cruising that far were the 12 type IX boats. This was Donitz's plan, but he was forced to lower the number to 6 boats because of Hitler's preferences of the Gibraltar area. Only five of the six were able to sail as one was in need of repairs.

The first ship of the drumbeaters sailed on December 18th, 1942, the next on the 23rd, one on the 24th and the last two on the 27th. Taking over two weeks to get to the US waters, they were given strict orders not to attack anything unless a warship, carrier or battle ship was located.

Operations ended on the American coast on February 6th. The drumbeats had sank 25 ships. The U-boats destined for home. The Paukenschlag operation began its fast surprise attack on the eastern seaboard. Other waves of U-boats followed that weren't considered Drumbeaters.

397 ships were sank, costing approximately 5000 lives though only 7 U-boats were sank and 302 Germans lost their lives. In May the US started running convoys on the east coast and proved very effective. Later, on July 19th the war shifted back to where it had all begun, into the North Atlantic where it would eventually end.

Operation Deadlight?

What was Operation Deadlight? It was the code name for the scuttling of unwanted German U-boats surrendered to the allies after the end of World War Two (WWII) from 1945-1946.

In the near future you may see these boats raised from the bed of the ocean since the British government has awarded a salvage contract for them.

Sources:

U-boat Net--The U-boat War 1939-1945
http://uboat.net

The Larconia Incident
http://uboat.net/ops/larconia.htm

Operation Drumbeat
http://uboat.net/ops/drumbeat.htm

Operation Deadlight
http://uboat.net/fates/deadlight.htm

D-Day: Invasion of Normandy

June 6, 1944

Although WWII didn't end until May 8, 1945, the ending began with the "Invasion of Normandy". Many Americans refer to this day as "D-day" which means only one thing--June 6, 1944. I like to think of this day as the day the Allied troops whooped butt on the coast of Normandy, France.

This is the day the greatest combination ever assembled of land, sea and air forces cast themselves upon the Normandy coast and struck with such an impact that it was the beginning of the end of the German military.

The planning of the invasion had begun as early as 1943, and early in that year US Navy forces began to arrive in the British Isles to prepare for the invasion. There were two bases established with "Base 1" in Ireland and "Base 2" in Scotland while they began construction of other bases in England to be used as "jumping off" points for the great attack. Soon other amphibious bases were constructed in every cove and bay to be used for harboring and loading naval vessels.

Intensive training operations from gas-mask drills to boat handling were initiated in every phase of warfare.

To take dominant command of all invasion forces, General Eisenhower arrived in England in January 1944. And by March the US 8th Airforce, the US 9th Airforce and the Royal Airforce started three months of constant pounding along the coast and in Northern France, the Low Countries and Western Germany.

The world knew it was coming--even Germany, but no one except a few men of the highest commanders in the Allied forces knew when or where the blow would come. Air attacks intensified as D-day approached. On June 1st the actual loading of assault troops began as the ships were sealed and the men briefed. Then they awaited the final "this is it" from the Supreme Allied Headquarters.

The invasion that had originally been planned for June 5th was postponed for twenty-four hours because of adverse weather conditions. The night of June 5th, last minute air strikes heightened while the great armada moved across the channel and paratroopers jumped far inland. The next twenty-four hours would tell the fate of Europe.

But everything had been planned long months before, figuring the last inch and the last second. A fleet of 4,000 ships, all of varying sizes and speeds, with split-second timing reached the rendezvous. From then on all the vessels continued to operate just as precise.

A stretch of beach on the Normandy coast between the Seine and halfway up the Cotentin Peninsula was selected for the landing. British troops were scheduled to land on the eastern beaches and American troops on the western beaches.

Sweeping channels right in to the beach, the minesweepers far ahead of the rest dropped lighted buoys to mark the channels they had already swept. Posted at every turn in the courses were reference vessels to guide traffic into the precise lanes. Special control vessels inside the 1,000 yard line off shore were to direct the assault boats in the last dash.

The great armada stretched all across the channel with cruisers, destroyers and battleships that guarded the flanks while air coverage acted as an impenetrable umbrella that protected the vessels against air attacks. Then the bombardment ships made their move and fired a blizzard of shells against the surprised Germans.

Transports lowered their assault craft, the troops hurled down and the amphibious craft sailed toward shore with their loads. The Navy and Army demolition teams drove through the shallow water, blowing up underwater obstacles. Nazi guns, lying outside the zone of fire began to shower them with heavy crossfire. Casualties were heavy. The US Coast Guard, especially outfitted and instructed, thrust in under the fire and made spectacular rescues. Then hidden guns were searched out by the bombers and ships' gun fire and they completely disabled them.

The landing beaches were secured by our troops by late afternoon. Sixty-six thousand troops had landed on the two American beaches by the end of the first 24 hours, and almost 250,000 Americans were ashore at the end of seven days.

Wow! Did the allied forces whoop some butt or what? The invasion of Normandy or D-day is my favorite part of WWII history. What energy and patriotism these guys had.

During Both and Between WWI & WWII

Dictators

World of the Wars Dictators

Just a few facts

Hirohito (1901- 1989) Emperor of Japan

Educated at the Imperial Education Institute in Tokyo

He visited Europe in 1921 and was the first Japanese prince to leave his native country.

Married in 1924

When his father, Yoshihito, died he succeeded to the throne

The expanding supremacy of a militaristic band of statesmen and heads of the army and navy is how his reign was marked.

In 1934 he was largely responsible of the establishment by Japan of the puppet state of Manchukuo.

(1937-1945)--was the period of the Sino-Japanese War and the Japanese attack on the United States.

1941 started their participation in WWII on the side of Germany and Italy

In 1945 after the second atom-bomb attack upon Japan, he issued the proclamation to his people telling them that they had surrendered all Japanese forces to the United Nations.

Hitler, Adolf (1889-1945) Germany "Fuhrer" (leader)

German political and military leader

Born in Austria in 1889

He became a German Citizen in 1932.

In his youth, he failed as an agricultural draftsman, artist, and businessman.

He received two decorations for bravery during WWI in a Bavarian regiment.

Hitler, along with six other men founded the National Socialist German Workers "Nazi" party. The purpose of the party was to heal domestic economic and political ills, and the betterment of its inferior international situation after losing WWI.

In 1923 he failed and was sentenced to five years in prison for treason after he attempted to seize control of the Bavarian government in Munich. He was paroled after serving nine months.

From 1928-1932--Under Hitler's leadership Nazi representation extensively multiplied.

In 1932 Hitler was defeated by Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg for the office of president of the German Republic.

In 1933 Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor.

In 1934 Hindenburg died, Hitler abolished the presidency, merging its functions with those of the chancellorship to which he assumed the title of "Der Fuhrer", or "supreme leader" of Germany. Hitler's plan included rearmament, economic reorganization from his violent anit-Semitic program. Germany's power and territory of Europe was rapidly increased.

Germany reoccupied a zone between France and Germany known as Rhineland.

In 1938 was the annexing of Austria.

In March of 1939 was the annexing of Czechoslavia, in September of 1939 Germany invaded Poland. This invasion was one of the factors that brought on WWII.

By 1941, Germany had conquered Poland, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Luxemburg, Belgium, France, Greece and Yugoslavia.

When Hitler personally took command of the forces invading Russia in December 1941, it was disastrous for Germany.

From 1943-1945 told the defeat of Germany.

In 1944 Hitler escaped an attempt with the Nazi party to assassinate him.

He committed suicide on April 30,1945 in Berlin.

Mussolini, Benito (1883-1945) Italian Dictator

Born in Predappio

Educated at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland--expelled from Switzerland in 1904 and later from Austria.

Marxian socialist

Started Lotta di Classe in 1911

Edited Avanti in Milan from 1912-1914

Member of Italian Communist Party

Corporal in WWI until February 1917 when he was wounded.

He founded the first "Fascio di Combattimento" (the fascist) in 1919 to suppress Bolshevism

By means of coup d'etat (march on Rome by his followers on October 28,1922) he gained premiership

In 1929 he terminated the sixty-year dispute between church and state.

In 1931 he conducted negotiations leading to the withdrawal of the church from Italian political activities.

In 1933 he announced a plan for a state controlled guild system for industry

In 1935 he ordered the invasion of Ethiopia

In 1938 he was made Marshall of the empire but retained title "Il Duce" (the leader)

In 1943 his alliance of Italy with Germany and the impending defeat of his country triggered his downfall.

On April 28,1945 the wrath of the people caused his execution in Milan

Stalin, Joseph (1879-1953) Soviet Dictator

Assumed name Yosif Vessarionovich Djugashvili

He was born in the Georgian Village of Gori.

He was accounted as one of the most notable men in Russian history and most influential in world affairs in the period immediately preceding WWII.

In 1902 he was arrested for revolutionary activities.

In 1902 he was exiled from Siberia.

In 1904 he escaped to Transcaucasia.

In 1905, during a revolution he directed a number of attacks on Czarist officials and so-called "expropriations" of bank in order to acquire funds for revolutionary activities.

From 1908-1913 he was imprisoned on several occasions and exiled but escaped.

In 1912 he became a member of the central committee of the Bolshevik Party.

In 1913 he exiled to northern Siberia and remained until 1917 he overthrew the czarist monarchy during a revolution.

From 1918 to 1921 there was a civil war and in 1920 a Russo-Polish war, he participated in the formulation of military policy and service as a political commissar (government representative).

In 1928 he made decisions resulting in the institution of national economic planning by means of a five year plan.

From 1922-1923 he was involved in revolutionary activities.

From 1924-1929 there was a struggle for power in Bolshevik party, the Soviet State and Third (Communist) International.

In 1929 he acquired unopposed leadership of the Soviet State.

In the 1930's he made decisions that forced the collectiveness of the peasantry which caused hundreds of thousands deaths and the deportation from their homes of millions of others. Millions of Soviet citizens and foreigners were forced into slave labor and the final conversion of the Soviet government into a terrorist police. The population had no civil liberties and the workers were at the disposition of the state. Millions of persons lost their jobs, homes, freedom, and many their lives.

From 1936 to 1938 he made the decision of the institution of trials where except for two or three close loyal associates, all surviving leaders of the Bolshevik Party and revolution were found guilty of treachery antedating and following the revolution, and were executed.

In 1941 during WWII, he directed the military operations of Soviet Germany against Nazi Germany.

The Roaring Twenties

A Time Between the World Wars

This is considered the romantic era of fashion. When you watch movies or see posters and pictures of the 1920s woman, you'll most likely see the fringed flapper dresses, raised way above the knee worn with feathered bandeaux and long strands of beads. But women did shock the world by raising their hemlines and bobbing their hair. However the hemline, although higher than it had ever been seen before, rested just below the knee in the 1920s and there were many other styles of dresses.

In the beginning of the 1920s, hemlines hovered at the lower calf and didn't change until 1925 when they rose to the bottom of the knee. But when the stock market plummeted in 1929, so did the hemlines back down to the lower calf.

The shorter hair was considered the "garconne", meaning 'boyish' in French. They lopped off the poufy Gibson Girl hairdo of the earlier 1900s to a shorter style, wearing it in bobbed, waved or shingled styles. However there were a few who chose not to cut their hair, and they usually wore it pulled back at the nape of the neck, knotting it in a chignon.

To complete the garconne look, women turned away from the hourglass shape of the late 1800s and early 1900s which resulted in a long, slim line with their waistlines falling to the hips. They flattened their busts and hips and unbind their waist that in earlier years had been corseted, measuring less than twenty inches. What a change! Can't you just imagine the freedom they felt.

Most clothing at this time was either made at home, by a dress maker or tailor. Though some clothes were purchased through department stores and mail order catalogues.

Rayon was sometimes used for dresses but most were made of cotton, silk, linen or wool. Many other countries influenced our styles. The kimono-styling from the Chinese gave us the color red and the embroidered silks. Whereas the Egyptian fashion influenced our accessory styles with the snake bracelets that encircled the upper arm which became popular with the discovery of King Tut's tomb.

Evening clothes for women consisted mostly of silks and velvets made into chiffons and taffetas. Elaborate beadwork embellished sleeveless silk chiffon dresses in the mid 1920s. The dresses were designed to move while dancing with some having long trailing sashes, trains or asymmetric hemlines. Fancy combs, scarves and bandeaux were worn, replacing hats for evening wear.

In 1923, helmet-like, brimless hats took the place of the early 1920s medium to large brims. However, these hats were considered unattractive on anyone other than the very slim, very pretty or very young. Larger women or matrons stuck with the brimmed hats that were considerably more flattering to their features.

Makeup was a must. Simple pale powder and creme rouge circles were applied to the cheeks. Lips were painted very red, creating a rosebud pout by emphasizing the width of the upper lip and deemphasizing the width of the bottom lip. Brows were plucked and thin arches were penciled in.

Stockings made of silk with black seams were held up by garters attached to corsets, or they were rolled to just above the knee with pretty elastic garters holding them there. Sports or casual stockings were usually made of cotton lisle.

Both men and women: Their bathing suits were usually made of body-hugging wool that consisted of sleeveless tank suits with under shorts.

Since the 1920s, men's fashion hasn't changed very much with the exception of knickers. These are pants ending just below the knee. However in the twenties, knickers were popular for day wear. Linen knickers, trim-fitting V-neck sweater vests, bow-tie and two toned shoes completed a fashionable outfit. Other than the bow-tie, Windsor-knot ties, some squared at the bottom and made of knit cotton were equally popular.

Men's suits were double-breasted with two or three buttons worn and vests. Usually the suits came with two pairs of pants, frequently cuffed and worn at a natural waistline. The fabrics used consisted of sharkskin, tweed, in serge, silk and wool. Tuxedos virtually resembled those of today.

The yachting look consisted of white slacks, a yachting cap and a navy blazer with gold buttons. This was considered sporty styles for the warmer climates. On the college scene, pants that were too long with very wide bottoms and deep cuffs--almost a bell-bottom style was popular.

The male hairstyle was parted in or near the middle, slicked back with an oily, perfumed hairdressing that added luster and kept it in place. Then topped it with either a broad brimmed straw hat, flat top or stiff brims called Boaters. These were popular in the summer. Casual wear for fall and winter included the English driving caps, and for everyday wear with sports coats and suits were the felt fedoras.

On a personal note, I've decided that many of the clothes were made from wool fabric. I'm itching just from reading and writing about it. And it reminds me of a plaid suit my mother bought and made me wear for school pictures in 1965. I was one scratching young girl. I hated that wool suit and it makes me wonder if the 1920s wool was as bad as it was in the 1960s. Oh well, we can all only guess to whether it was or not.

Slang From the Twenties to the Forties

The way people talked in the twenties, thirties, and wasn't that much different from today. As a matter of fact you'll see a number of the same words used today. Of course speech patterns change from town to town, state to state and country to country. But one that's stayed the same all through the decades, although different, is fabs and the use of slang. This is like "a breath of fresh air" to me since I assumed all forms of dialogue then would be stuffy and boring. Yes, I know what assuming does and so it did it to me. What I've done is compile lists of popularly used slang for each ten years.

TWENTIES

To the flappers, the most common slangs dealt with drinking alcohol or being intoxicated.

alcohol--giggle water or hooch

to drink--to lap

speakeasy--gin mill

plesantly tipsy--half-cut or soaked with a bar rag

drunk--tanked, stewed to the hat, splifficated, shot, shellacked, potted, polluted, plastered, piffled, pie-eyed, out like a light, ossified, oiled, juiced, jiggered, jammed, fried, crocked, canned, bolognied, barreled

person who could hold their liquor--non-skid

serious drinker--hip hound

drunken goof--flask

drunken sailor--apple alley

THIRTIES

Language in the thirties, adopted by the young swing fans came from the jive used by jazz musicians.

swing fans--cats or alligators

Instruments

saxophone--gobble pipe

drums--skins

xylophone--wood pile

guitar--gitter

accordion--groanbox

clarinet--gob stick

trombone--tram

string base--doghouse

cornet--iron horn

Two Basic Jazz Schools:

Hot (Swing)

*low down blues--gut-bucket

*free and easy jamming or improvising--barrel-house

*wild swing--clam-bake

*extremely slow swing--center collegiate

*very hot swing--dillinger

Sweet (Conventional)

*old-fashioned jazz--corn

*overly sentimental music--schmaltz

*restrained jazz--salon

*cloying, sweet jazz--lollypop

*sweet band--the long underwear gang

Musicians

band members except for the leader--sidemen

play by ear--fake

drummer--skin tickler

a magician who used sheet music--paperman

violinist--squeaker

female singer--canary

guitarist--whanger

wood instrumentalist--lip-splitter

Techniques of Music

a soft finish--easing it in

final chorus--wong worked into its sock chorus

notes--spots

lay-outs--rests

a medley of songs--after a gang

warming up--licking the chops or frisking the whiskers

pick up the beat--quit mugging light and mug heavy

play without an arrangement--to jam

play louder--wang it

to practice a new song in private--to woodshed

a hot passage or performance--a solid sender that would chill ya

to improvise--to kick out

to play with vigor or inspiration--to be in the groove, break it down, get hot, swing out, send, give it a ride, go to town

musical embellishment in an improvisation--a break, take-off, get-off, riff, lick

FORTIES

The slang for youth of the forties was inspired by the Jive of the thirties. These next slangs describe body-parts.

an ugly face--puss, phiz, map

the face--knob, index

the body--the frame

mustache--brush

whiskers--face lace, moss

head--biscuit, dome, idea pot, noggin, think box

eyes--blinkers, lamps, spotters, pies

eyelids--shutters

toes--ten

ears--flippers, sails, flops, mikes, lugs (large ears)

feet--plates, hocks

nose--sneezer, handle (large nose), schnozz, horn

legs--uprights, drumsticks, stumps, pillars, stems, slits

knees--prayer dukes

jaws--chops

tonsils--snags

mouth--bone box

teeth--chewers, choppers, crumb crunchers

stomach--bread basket, pale

neck--stretcher

elbows--hinges

heart--pump, clocker, ticker

shoulders--brace o' broads

arms--floppers, brace o' hookers

fingers--wigglers, feelers, stealers, fish hooks, pickers, forks

hands--grabbers, paws, meat hooks, paddlers

fists--dukes

Memorial Day: A Memorial For Those Who Died

For most of us, Memorial Day means a day off work, a holiday. And for me, it used to mean a day off of work while the kids were in school. But the true reason to celebrate this day is to honor those who died in wars to protect us, our homeland and our rights.

I'll first tell you a little background about Memorial Day. Originally called Decoration Day, the Memorial Day holiday was first proclaimed on May 5, 1868 by General John Logan in his General Order No. 11. This day was first observed on May 30, 1868. Flowers were placed on the graves of Civil War soldiers who had died for both the Union and Confederate armies. Until after World War I, the South refused to recognize Decoration Day and honored their dead on separate days. Today it is now celebrated in almost every state on the last Monday in May.

Flags are used to decorate graves and should be flown half-staff until noon during Memorial Day.

New York City has quite a number of World War I memorials. Reasons for this vary from many feelings about the war--idealism, patriotism and/or sorrow. New Yorkers had two hometown regiments in the middle of the fighting, the "Fighting 69th" and the "Harlem Hellfighters."

These memorials can be found hanging high on the sides of public buildings in downtown Manhattan and at remote street crossings in Queens and Brooklyn. Where some have become part of their community, others are hidden and forgotten.

Most of New York City's memorials had been put up by the local regimental armories. A group of mothers whose sons had been killed in the war, "The Gold Star Mothers," donated a statue of a doughboy. It stands in Park Slope, Brooklyn in front of the 14th New York regiment armory. Today a wreath is laid on the statue during a Memorial ceremony led by the community and a veterans group.

In front of the Health Department in Chelsea, lower Manhattan stands a typical World War I monument of bronze and heroic with a bayonet flourished. This statue is dedicated to the "Soldiers and Sailors", but the dates on the statue, cover the period before the United States entered the war. Though this could be to cover the period of neutrality when many died from German ship sinkings.

The clock in the tower of Pier A, Battery Park, lower Manhattan, dedicated in 1919 was the first World War I memorial in the United States. Now the tower can only be viewed from a distance due to the decline in port traffic, causing the pier to be closed to the public.

The 7th Regiment memorial on Central Park and East 67th Street is similar to the Chelsea statue and is a block away from their armory.

Unlike the armory statues, Brooklyn's official war memorial (produced in 1921 in Prospect Park), is sort of cabalistic and lugubrious. There's an angelic figure supporting, protecting or drawing in a weary soldier. Behind the angel are the names of the borough's war dead on long panels. The inscription at the bottom reads that they died for "the cause of universal peace." Although there was only one woman listed, it was dedicated to the men and women who died in conflict.

On the edge of Forest Park in Queens, the Richmond Hill statue wasn't put up by the city or an armory, but by the community of Richmond Hill. It's inscription talks about wars fought with noble self-sacrifice and determination.

Then there are probably more than a hundred plaques of testaments to the soldiers of times gone by. Across the front of one of these is P.S. 134 plaque, on 18th Avenue in Brooklyn. This plaque has a quote from the Gettysburg address with a suppressed design and mostly English and Irish names.

Dedicated to the Merchant Marines is a plaque garnished with a quote from President Warren G. Harding, "These men rendered one of the greatest services that could have been done for our nation and civilization's cause. Hundreds of precious lives were lost--a loss that can never be made up by their country." The plaque was attached to the Customs House in 1921, where all ship passengers had to pass. But due to a recline in traffic, as with the Pier A in Battery Park caused the building to be changed to the National Museum of the American Indian.

The John Purroy Mitchel plaque, near 95th Street in Central Park is extremely noticeable and is passed by joggers on their daily run. Who is John Purroy Mitchel you might ask? In 1913, at the age of twenty-five, he was elected mayor of New York City--youngest person to hold that office and thereby nicknamed, "the Boy Mayor." In 1917 he lost the election and volunteered for the Army Air Corps. He was killed while in training in 1918, seemingly from falling out of his plane.

Recognition of soldiers were also done with street names. Michell Place in Manhattan was name after John Purroy Mitchell. Avenue A was name York Avenue after Sergeant York in 1928. The "Fighting 69th" were the most celebrated of the city's regiments. This was primarily an Irish regiment from Manhattan. Father Duffy's (a chaplain) statue adorns Times Square. Two New York City boroughs named street lineaments after Sergeant Joyce Kilmer who was in fact from New Jersey. One that sits alongside the courthouse is the Bronx's Joyce Kilmer Park and the second is a shopping district along King's Highway, Brooklyn's Joyce Kilmer Square. Henshaw and Staff streets in upper Manhattan and Finn Square in Tribeca, lower Manhattan (not marked now) were other streets named after soldiers.

In conclusion, I feel these are wonderful tributes to the men who died to save us from sure devastation had the course of events been different. So lets remember on this coming Memorial Day to say a prayer of thanks for the Veteran's of World War I and those of other wars that were fought for our country.

Sources:

Memorial Day Flag Etiquette
http://funnelweb.utcc.utk.edu/~dmdragon/flagetiq.html

Memorial Day History
http://funnelweb.utcc.utk.edu/background.html

Trenches on the Web--Special Survey of New York
WWI Monuments/Memorials by Laura Canon
http://www.worldwar1.com/sfnycm.htm

Kim Cox © 2010
Forest Photography by Batkhela