Food-conservation efforts continued in Lawrence throughout the fall, as volunteers canvassed the town asking citizens, especially housewives and cooks, to sign a pledge card promising their best efforts in waste-free cooking. According to the Lawrence Journal-World in November 1917, Chancellor ...
The unwritten rules of many facets of social behavior, including public displays of affection, began to shift during the Great War. This is demonstrated by a report from Camp Funston, Kansas, where women visiting their husbands or sweethearts would indulge in what the Journal-World called ...
Two Lawrence women received thanks this week from a Navy man who was grateful for having received a “knitted helmet” made by Mrs. Belle Wilmot, with yarn purchased by Mrs. Fred Morris. The item was probably of a type produced by Red Cross knitters across the nation in 1917. Daniel Sherry, ...
On Oct. 20, 1917, the Journal-World announced a new way for citizens on the home front to ease the trials of U.S. soldiers serving overseas:“To make the soldiers in the trenches a little more happy and to add pleasure to their idle hours, the Journal-World is today starting a Tobacco Fund for ...
Lawrence news in October 1917 included several war-related items. The “Great War” was having an effect on KU’s chemistry department this semester: “There are nearly 700 students taking work in the department and there are fewer professors than usual. The cost of laboratory fees has gone ...
In early October, the Journal-World interviewed several University of Kansas faculty members and found many in favor of compulsory military drill for students. The policy was officially adopted a few days later at a meeting of the University Senate: “Compulsory physical exercise for every ...
Although several individuals had departed Lawrence since the war’s outbreak to serve in various positions on the front and at home, the first large-scale departure of troops didn’t take place until autumn, 1917. The Lawrence Journal-World of Oct. 1 described the scene: “The Lawrence units ...
In late September and early October of 1917, festivities such as dances and concerts were held for the soldiers temporarily stationed in Lawrence before they were sent to Fort Sill for further training. Among these parties was a dinner prepared and served to Company M at the University of ...
Officials in Washington made a decision this week directly affecting the military organizations from the Lawrence area. According to press dispatches, the First Kansas Infantry was to be “consolidated with the Second Kansas to form the 137th Infantry, the only Kansas Infantry regiment in the ...
In the days leading up to their departure for Fort Sill, Oklahoma, local military organizations continued to camp in Lawrence. Battery B, which had been staying at Woodland Park, was forced to vacate its sleeping quarters to make room for September’s Douglas County Fair. The battery moved ...
John Musgrave, a local Vietnam War veteran and participant in Ken Burns’ new documentary on the conflict, will speak at a screening of the film Monday at Liberty Hall. Musgrave’s experiences as a Marine serving in Vietnam are featured prominently in Burns’ 18-hour series “The Vietnam ...
Russell Cowgill of Lawrence wrote home this week from aviation training school in Dayton, Ohio. According to the Lawrence Journal-World, “Cowgill was a K. U. football player last fall, but the new sport of flying is what he calls a ‘rare sport.’ His brief letter follows: 'Well, I’ve had ...
Vietnam veteran John Musgrave went to war with a learned hatred of the enemy and no knowledge of what the conflict was about beyond that of Cold War rhetoric.But over the years, those feelings ultimately gave way to an understanding of and empathy toward those men he fought a half-century ago. ...
The oldest structure on the Haskell Indian Nations University campus is receiving a long-awaited makeover this week. By lunchtime Thursday, crews had just about reached the halfway point in replacing Hiawatha Hall’s old, leaky roof with brand-new architectural asphalt shingles. The repairs ...
State budget cuts, whether war-related or not, were affecting students at the elementary and high school levels in Lawrence in 1917.According to a Journal-World article from early September, the usual reserve in the Board of Education budget had been cut by two-thirds, while war conditions had ...
Following the compulsory military draft of young men nationwide, the state of Kansas attempted a voluntary registration of women for war service. As explained in a Lawrence Journal-World article in early August, “There is nothing compulsory about the registration of women…. They are merely ...
For nearly 115 years, they have quietly guarded the University of Kansas from their seventh-floor perch. Now, four of the hand-carved grotesques lining the façade of Dyche Hall are being taken down to make way for brand-new replicas. Staff at the KU Natural History Museum say the mythical ...
With involvement in the “Great War” came new concerns about security on the home front, especially involving local bridges and industries. In speaking of the need for extra vigilance, city engineer E. H. Dunmire commented, “A little dynamite in the right place could do a lot of damage in ...
The Lawrence Journal-World was to face challenges in the coming year, as several of its staff had enlisted in the military. Even considering the inconvenience that this would entail, the company appeared proud that so many of its men were to serve, either as volunteers or after having been ...
Today’s story comes “from somewhere in France with the American troops,” where a recent KU student was worried about the state of his grades. Having left school in the spring of 1917, volunteering for the army months before the first draft, the young man wrote a letter back home to try to ...