The Military Vehicle Preservation Association is sponsoring a reenactment of the 1919 military convoy that traveled across the Lincoln Highway, from the East Coast to the West Coast, to celebrate the victory in World War I. The 2019 MVPA Transcontinental Convoy got on the road August 10th in York, PA and ends September 14th in San Francisco, CA. Click here to read more about the convoy, and its arrival in Galion, OH on August 17. More information on the Convoy is available from MVPA here. If you are wondering where the Convoy is at any moment, click on this link for the Live Convoy Tracker.

A group of 15 Connecticut students participated in the "Digging Into History: WWI Trench Restoration” program in Seicheprey, France this summer. The Connecticut State Library’s program brought participants to the site of the first German offensive against American troops to restore a section of trench once occupied by Connecticut’s 102nd Infantry Regiment. Click here to read about about the trench restoration effort, and the experiences of Ridgefield High School seniors Aaron Cohen and Mairead Lacey in France during the three-week program.

Only the names on the telegrams were different. Otherwise, the six were exactly the same: Same date. Same place. Even the same wording. “It must’ve been gut-wrenching,” said Paul Vassar, who still has a hard time grasping what it was like for his hometown — losing six of its young men on the same day in World War I. A retired district judge, Vassar has written a book about this tragic chapter in his hometown’s history. It’s called “The Boys: The Story of a Town and War.” Click here to read more about the book,, and how the tragic story "was lost to time" in an Oklahoma town after WWI.

An errant Google search and a last-minute, fortuitous find at the National Archives in Washington, D.C., made James Theres’ documentary “The Hello Girls” come together. Theres, with three documentaries under his belt, started searching in 2017 for a project to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I in November 1918. Read more about how a mistake in a Google search for information on WWI set him on the path to his award-winning documentary.

A weekend event featuring the Living History Volunteer Corps and living historians presenting real WWI artifacts for visitors to inspect, a panel discussion on challenges faced by returning soldiers from war and a presentation on the race riots of the “Red Summer” of 1919 are among the August offerings at the National WWI Museum and Memorial. On Saturday, Aug. 24 at 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. and Sunday, Aug. 25 at 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. the Museum and Memorial is sponsoring Living the Great War. This free weekend event features the Living History Volunteer Corps and other World War I living historians sharing their knowledge and inviting the public to inspect their collections in a camp setting on the Museum and Memorial grounds. Click here to read more about this and other August activities at the National WWI Museum and Memorial

K.C. Picard, Idaho WW1 Centennial Commissioner, tells the story of how 2nd Lt Parke Tolman Scott of Montana kept the home front informed of what was happening with the AEF in France through his DATELINE FRANCE: “Letters from Over There” postings to the Dillon Tribune newspaper in Beaverhead County, MT. Read more about how the 25-year-old gas and oil officer for the AEF Quartermaster Depot in France reached out to his family and community with news about the war front and commentary that was in keeping with the American Expeditionary Forces’ strict military and security needs.

The shelling stopped on Nov. 11, 1918, sending millions of American soldiers back to the United States to pick up where they had left off before joining or being drafted into the war effort. For one officer, the return meant facing a perfunctory public welcome and superficial support. A series of posters — on display at the National World War I Museum and Memorial in Kansas City, Mo., until Sept. 15 — designed by the Army to show America’s discharged soldiers how they should behave once they returned to civilian life, provides evidence of the nation’s blindness to the toll modern war took on those who endured it. The Army didn’t want the flood of veterans returning home to become a disruptive presence or a financial burden on society. Click here to read the entire New York Times Magazine article about the post-war debates over the government’s responsibility to care for its military forces in the war's aftermath.

Walter Benjamin (1892–1940) was a philosopher, cultural critic, and essayist. Associated with the Frankfurt School, Benjamin influenced many of his contemporaries, including Bertolt Brecht, Gershom Scholem, and Theodor Adorno. Benjamin’s best-known essays include “The Task of the Translator,” “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” and “Theses on the Philosophy of History.” In 1940, he killed himself in Portbou, on the French-Spanish border, when his attempt to escape Nazi forces was thwarted. Click here to read Benjamin's penetrating remarks on the  barbarity of the Great War, reprinted from The Storyteller Essays on the Literary Hub web site.

In August 5th's edition of the World War I Centennial News Podcast, Episode 134, host Theo Mayer spoke with David Rockefeller Jr., scion of the legendary American family and a very successful business leader and philanthropist in his own right. Mr. Rockefeller is involved in many prestigious non-profit organizations, including the Council on Foreign Relations and the Museum of Modern Art. In the interview, Mr. Rockefeller discusses the connection between his family's early philanthropic ventures and the First World War, his impression of the National Memorial maquette, and why WWI is important to remember.  Click here to read the entire interview.

The WW1 Centennial News Podcast is about WW1 THEN: 100 years ago this week, and it's about WW1 NOW: News and updates about the centennial and the commemoration.  Available on our web site, iTunes, Google Play, Podbean, TuneIn, Stitcher Radio on Demand.  Spotify  listen on Youtube. New - Comment and ask questions via twitter @TheWW1podcast

Episode #135
Focus On: War in The Sky

Episode #135

Host - Theo Mayer

Introduction - Host | @ 01:45

Balloonatic: James Allen Higgs Jr. - Host | @ 04:35

Erwin Bleckley & the Lost Battalion - LtCol Doug Jacobs USA (Ret.) | @ 08:05

WWI War Tech: Interrupter Gear - Host | @ 13:50

PTSD in WWI Pilots - Mark Wilkins | @ 16:40

Eddie Rickenbacker Profile - Host | @ 23:30

Quentin Roosevelt Killed - Host | @ 26:05

New Memorial to WWI Airmen - Michael O’neal & Robert Kasprzack | @ 28:05

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