By Lea Seago - Class of 2013
To conclude my series of WWI articles I wanted to add bits of information worth noting, but not complete article information nor of great in-depth interest for me. Hopefully my loyal readers will understand.
Ernest Hemingway, formerly of Oak Park, Illinois, as was I, did not appeal to me when I read the true facts regarding his service. He and his two friends, John Dos Passos, and poet E. E. Cummings seemed to be on the dark side of WWI history with exaggerations. My intent was to give you a focused view of extraordinary events and people around the world with war involvement. Lives were enriched and lives were devastated, therefore the three friends in literature are for you to research.
1914 was the year German Kaiser Wilhelm II, eldest grandchild of Queen Victoria, decided that timing was perfect for establishing a world German Empire. Wilhelm was a cousin of King George V, United Kingdom and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia.
14 August 1914 – The Empire of Japan issued an ultimatum to Germany, evacuate Tsing-Tau. China had leased Tsing-Tau to Germany. Japan was bound by treaty to safeguard Far Eastern trade for the British. Tsing-Tau was a port city located on the Yellow Sea Coast.
7 May 1915 – Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt perished when the RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-boat. The amazing twist in his life story is that he was to sail on the Titanic but changed his ticket to travel later. The Titanic sank on 15 April 1912. Alfred was brother to Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, sculptor, known for her WWI military pieces.
5 June 1916 – Lord Kitchener was lost on the sinking of the HMS Hampshire while on his way to visit British troops in Archangel, Russia. Lord Kitchener was known the world over as the recruiting poster boy for Britain. Field Marshal Horatio Herbert Kitchener died in the Atlantic Ocean off the Orkney Islands. He rests in effigy in the All Souls Chapel, St Paul’s Cathedral in London.
1916 – The Trans-Siberian Railway was completed. The route connected Moscow to Vladivostok, which was nearly the entire length of Russia. It spanned 5,778 miles in length and passed through 8 time zones.
6 April 1917 – There were approximately 2,000 women volunteers serving as enlisted members of the United States Navy. By 1918, that number had increased to 11,000. In August 1918, the Marine Corps, faced with heavy losses in France during the spring and summer, decided to enlist women. They were mainly assigned to clerical jobs.
17 July 1917 – King George V was responsible for changing the British royal family name from House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to House of Windsor as a result of anti-German sentiment in Britain.
1918 – Maginal Enright Barney, daughter of Anna Lloyd Wright, sister of architect Frank Lloyd Wright was known for her poster art, “Follow the Pied Piper Join the US School Garden Army” and “The Seeds of Victory Insure the Fruits of Peace.” President Wilson allocated $250,000 from the National Security and Defense Fund to establish Urban and Suburban home and school gardening programs (Liberty Gardens and in turn Victory Gardens).
John Singer Sargent’s “Gassed” is one of the 10 best paintings of WWI. The Imperial War Museum in the UK has it in their permanent collection.
21 April 1918 – The Ace of all aces took his final flight, during WWI. He was known as the Red Baron or Manfred Freiherr Von Richthofen, officially credited with 80 air combat victories for the German Air Force. Don’t be totally sad as he is the inspiration for Peanuts, “Snoopy” using his dog house as his Sopwith Camel fighter plane. Cheers for Aviator Snoopy dog!
Adolph Hitler served the Germans as a Corporal in WWI. He was wounded twice and awarded several medals. In October 1918, he was partially blinded in a mustard gas attack in Belgium. He was known as a sloppy unmilitary soldier with an odd personality, but took on dangerous assignments from 1913-1918.
28 November 1918, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany affixed his seal and signed his name to a document renouncing for all time his right to the imperial crown. He spent his last years in the Dutch Manor house, Huis Doorn. I visited the manor house and grounds in Holland on 8 August 1987. It was a lovely quiet place.
February 1919 – In bitter cold weather, south of the Arctic Circle, 3 United States Battalions attached to British command suffered 400 casualties fighting the Bolshevik at Archangel.
Al Capone’s brother was a doughboy.
An image of an American doughboy in bronze serves as the doorknocker of the St. Mihiel Cemetery Chapel doors in Thiacourt, France.
27 February 2011, Frank Buckles passed away at age 110. He was the last survivor of WWI. He joined the Army at age 15 and sailed to Europe through Halifax on the White Star Liner, RMS Carpathia, December 1917. The vessel is famous for its Titanic rescue mission.
25 June 2018, Mobile, Alabama – A 1918 Harley Davidson built for WWI was on display in the area last week.
26 July 2018 – The new WWI Forever Stamp “Turning the Tide” was released at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum.
13 August 2018 – Arts, Briefly New York Times...Looted artifacts going back to Iraq. Britain returned a handful of objects, some up to 5,000 years old, that were seized by the police from an art dealer in London. Gertrude Bell would be proud.
Cher Ami, “Winged Warrior” was one of 600 pigeons serving in WWI. She was donated to the US Army by a pigeon fancier in Great Britain. A video production of Cher Ami’s story will be featured in the National Museum of the US Army (now under construction) in the Experiential Learning Center.
Red Cross Pearls, December 1918 – The most notable fundraiser to help soldiers returning from WWI, damaged, sick and in distress was the British Red Cross Pearl Appeal. Wealthy ladies in Britain, as well as the US, wanted to do something with their time to help the recovery process from war. Some families lost their only son or all of their sons, husbands and brothers. What to do for help, healing and remembrance.
The most precious possession these ladies had, many times family heirlooms, were their pearls. So the pearl appeal was born, through newspaper advertising and word of mouth. Prominent ladies asked for a pearl in memory of, or for funds to help restore health to soldiers returning from war.
The Red Cross played a huge role in Europe during WWI, so donations were sorely needed. The pearls were to be collected and Christies was to auction the necklace(s) for the Red Cross. All pearls were to remain anonymous so royal pearls and pearls from the ordinary people would hold the same significance in honor of those wounded and lost.
Lord Kitchener’s sister, Frances Parker, donated 3 pearls and 3 rubies to be used for clasps in honor of her brother. Noel, Countess of Rothes, survivor of the Titanic sinking, donated two pearls that she was wearing that night in April of 1912. The appeal was so successful that 41 necklaces were made and auctioned off for the sum of 3 million dollars in today’s money.
It is said that pearls worn by a happy person have a warm and more lustrous glow. Pearls are like gentle moments strung together for the Happy Person - they cannot help but glow.
Gentle moments, like pearls, seem to be so few. Yet, how rich and warm and beautiful they make our lives.
It takes only a few moments to enjoy a talk with someone about good things instead of the bad; it takes only a few moments to drop a line to a shut-in when attention means so much. It takes only a few moments to see a sunset, or read a scripture, or to listen to a child talk.
It takes only a few moments to open the door to happiness. And if happiness seems only a few moments long, so will trouble if we open the door and let it out instead of harboring it.
Life is made up of a few moments all strung together like pearls. Each moment is a pearl, and it is up to us to pick the ones with the highest luster. If we do not have time to do great things, take a few gentle moments and do small things in a great way.
Joyce Sequichie Hifler (Cherokee)
Di Ka No He SGi-Di Go We Li SGi | 
13 FEBRUARY 2019 AVHOFS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING BRIEFS
CENTURY CLUB
Individual ticket sales and table sales are now open for Veterans Heritage Project's "Saluting Stories of Service" Celebration fundraising dinner. Organize a table of your friends and save $50 per person. At the March 9 event you will get to meet special guest, Medal of Honor Recipient Sammy Davis, known as the "real Forest Gump", dance to big band swing music, perhaps win a trip to Washington DC, and most importantly, support the connection between veterans and students through VHP's oral history program. 
On January 28, 2019, at Palm Desert, CA, Civic Center Park, Dr. Alex White (Class of 2014), and Dennis DeFrain (Class of 2013) were presented with Mensch for All Seasons awards by the International Mensch Foundation. 
The ladies of the AVHOFS, Gerry Berger (President, AVHOFS and Class of 2016), Rachel Gutierrez (in blue, Class of 2016), Toni Grimes (in red, Class of 2018) and Kathleen Laurier (not shown, Class of 2012) supported over 200 female veterans that visited the Women's Section during the AZ Maricopa County Standdown. These pink tubs represent the closing and packing up of the section for a successful 2019. Until next year ladies!
