May 26, 1919. Monday scenes.

Oil brokers, May 26, 1919.  Wichita Falls Texas.

In Wichita Falls, oil brokers conducted their business on the busy curb side.

Treaty news still dominated, but other events were creeping in, including disaster and adventure.

As well as misbehavior and lust.  A Lusk businessman had departed that town with an 18 year old girl, still in school, and abandoned his wife and six children. The shamed couple had relocated to Venice California, where they'd opened a "root beer concession".

The youthful participant in the illicit tryst admitted she had "loved unwisely".  She was now with child.

 Hotel headquarters of the American Red Cross in Berlin.

The Red Cross was extending a helping hand in Germany, now that the war was over. And Germany certainly needed one.

May 25, 1919. Red Cross Office Work.

D.M. Merritt, 1st Lieut. American Red Cross, Bureau of Requirements. Capt. Hampton Anderson Publicity Man.  American Red Cross Headquarters. Berlin.  May 25, 1919.

May 18, 1919. Recalling the recent war.

The war wasn't actually technically over, with the Peace Treaty not yet signed, and it certainly wasn't forgotten.  It figured prominently on the cover illustration for the New York Tribunes graphic issue for this day, which was a Sunday feature.

Ft. Riley and Camp Funston, May 18, 1919.  Camp Funston, the locus of the great Flu Epidemic, would soon cease to exist and just become the wooded lot near Ft. Riley that it is today.

 Organizations laying wreaths as a statute of Joan d'Arc, Paris, May 18, 1919.

Gatherings seemed to be going on this Sunday in Paris.

Red Cross Societies banquet, Paris, May 18, 1919.

And dramatic news was going on, concerning the advancement of aircraft across the Atlantic, and in general.

A Cheyenne paper gave banner headlines to the loss of one of the U.S. Navy seaplanes attempting to cross the Atlantic, but it was the weather item, the same today as it was a century ago, that drew my eye to this one.

May 9, 1919. French scenes.

Scenes, some sad, from the 1919 Fair Of Paris.

Convalescing U.S. soldiers in American Red Cross facility, France.

Red Cross Tent City, Paris, Champs de Mars, as photographed from a nearby Ferris wheel.

May 7, 1919. War and Peace

On this day,, at 3:00 p.m., the German delegation to the Paris Peace Conference received the text of the treat for the first time.

For that matter, a lot of the world was seeing it for the first time, and the treaty's terms proved to be surprising even in Allied countries.

After a speech by Clemenceau and one by the chief of the German delegation, which acknowledged that the text was received and not yet reviewed, the Conference adjourned for the day.

In Paris, British, American and French delegates executed the Treaty of Guaranty, which guaranteed the French border against German aggression.  Of course, the delegates executing it did not bind nations such as the United States which required legislative ratification for a treaty to take effect. The U.S. Senate did not ratify the treaty.

The treaty had been created to address the concerns of the French over the possibility of renewed German aggression.  In exchange for the guaranty of the French border, the French relented on wanting to redraw the French border all the way to the Rhine.

It's doubtful that the Germans would have willingly agreed to the loss of the Rhineland, and frankly the proposal, in my view, may have caused the war to resume.  The Allies, given Germany's condition, could likely have won it in rapid fashion, but then they would have found themselves occupying a collapsed, unhappy, German state.  The French demands, while understandable, were unrealistic.

Also unrealistic was Wilson's thought that the United States Senate, in 1919, would have ratified a treaty committing the United States to the defense of France.  1945 was one thing, 1919, quite another.

Communications staff at the American Red Cross Home Service Station, Brest, France.

An uprising in the southern Ukraine tossed the Reds out in that region. . . only temporarily, of course.

April 29, 1919. Germans Arrive. Americans Departing. Spring Horse Show

The German delegation arrived in Paris to start their negotiations with the Allies.  Of note, it had taken the Allies all this time from the Armistice to come up with a treaty to present to the Germans.

In New York, more traditional peacetime events were going on, albeit interesting to benefit a martial one, and a one that represented a different technology, making for an interesting contrast.

Still in France, Americans were coming home, or otherwise moving on with their lives.

Enlisted men and officers at a dance with Red Cross personnel in Brest.

 Canteen Directeress Florence (Henderson) Payne a few days after her marriage to Col. E. V. R. Payne of the 25th Engineers.  Some of the service personnel relationships with Red Cross personnel obviously had moved on to new levels.

Walking wounded embarking at Brest.

The U.S. suspended its "black list" of nations outside of the declared belligerents who traded with the enemy in the U.S. view.  The list, promulgated under the Trading With the Enemy Act, had been hard on companies in some regions, such as South America.

April 21, 1919. Des Moines river front, Red Cross councils, Victory Loan Drive.

Des Moines, Iowa riverfront.  April 21, 1919.

Officers and War Council of the American Red Cross, including President Wilson and former President Taft.

President Wilson was photographed with Red Cross dignitaries, including former President Taft, on this day in 1919.  Most of the men photographed were wearing frock coats, which remained full daily formal wear at that time (they weren't the equivalent of tuxedos) even as Edwardian suits were coming in.  The latter were regarded as less formal.

American hospital ward in France, April 21, 1919.

Of course, a lot of men were still in France.

American engineers in France.

Some of the men back were participating in a big Victory Loan drive which was kicking off in earnest on this Monday.

Victory Loan Parade, Seattle Washington.

April 19, 1919. Opening Day, April flowers, Poles advance, Rebuilding the churches, Red Cross in action, Belgians on the stage.

The fateful 1919 baseball season opened on this day in 1919, with the Brooklyn Robbins (what the Dodgers were before they were called that) defeating the Boston Braves twice in a double headers.

J. C. Leyendecker graced the cover of The Saturday Evening Post with a spring centered illustration.  Easter Sunday for 1919 was the following day.

Easter was directly recalled on the cover of The Country Gentleman, but with an illustration featuring a little kid with chicks.  This is a traditional Easter theme, but one I've always found a bit odd.

On this day in 1919, Polish forces entered Vilnius in an event that wasn't Easter focused by any means.

Vilnius in some ways symbolizes the nature of post war Eastern Europe, and indeed to some extent Europe in general.  The Poles entered it as part of their war against the Russian Reds.  The town had been of course in the Russian Empire.  It's population was both Polish and Lithuanian and nationalist from both countries saw it as theirs.  In the context of Russian imperial rule, its mixed population hadn't created nationalist problems, but now it was.

Pilsudski took quick steps to try to make it plain that the sovereignty of the region would be determined by plebiscite which he hoped would result in support for a federal union he envisioned which would have included Poland, Lithuania and Ukraine, as well as some other regions in some versions of the plan.  The Poles and the Ukrainians are in fact very close in ethnicity, although they are somewhat religiously divided. The Poles and the Lithuanians, however, are largely Catholic, but the Lithuanians were not close to the Poles in ethnicity.  A newly independent Ukrainian government was horrified by the thought of the town being anything but Lithuanian, and Polish nationalist weren't keen on that thought.  The right to include the city within respective national boundaries lead to the Polish Lithuanian War shortly thereafter.  Ironically, it was only Polish success in the Russo Polish War which kept Lithuania from being invaded by the Soviets and at the conclusion of the Russo Polish War it was included within Poland.  The Lithuanians, however, never accepted that fact and did not establish diplomatic relations with Lithuania until 1938.

Today Vilnius is the capitol of Lithuania, but that reflects the results of World War Two.  After the invasion of Poland by the Germans and the Soviets in 1939, the city was turned over to Lithuania but then shortly thereafter Lithuania was invaded by the Red Army.  It was subsequently invaded by the Germans in Operation Barbarossa, and during their occupation most of the large Polish population and the Jewish population was removed from the city. Today its ethnically a Lithuanian city, the result of German oppression of the Poles and Jews.

The ruins of St. Albain Nazaire in France.

On this day in 1919, the Holy See announced plans to raise funds to repair the 1,300 churches in France damaged during the Great War.

How odd that this would fall so close to current events.

Class in Plainfield, New Jersey, snipping filling for pillows for the Red Cross.

The Red Cross was still at work in Europe and of course in Russia and therefore efforts to support it kept on.

Red Cross headquarters in Archangel.

In Washington D. C. Belgian troops who had been in the United States in support of a Victory Loan campaign paraded to the Keith Theater in Washington D. C.

Monday, April 14, 1919. Nothing to return to in France, returning to U.S. from Italy, temporary housing.

Where Cantigny had been, April 14, 1919.

The 332nd Infantry on the Duca d'Acosta returning from their World War One service in Italy.  They arrived in New York on this day in 1919.

On this same day, the Red Cross photographed its set of instructions for temporary housing, a critical need at the time.  I don't know if they published it on this day as well, but it must have been close to this day.

April 1, 1919. Des Moines Waterfront, Rheims in ruins, Concern of Japan. . . in Mexico. And Wars.

Des Moines, Iowa.  April 1, 1919.

On this same day in which Des Moines waterfront was photographed, a Red Cross photographer toured the Red Cross facilities in destroyed Rheims.

Scenes like those depicted there demonstrate pretty ably why the French were taking a hard line view in the peace talks in Paris.

Red Cross staff at Rheims, including local volunteers.

Red Cross facility in Rheims for those returning home to find no homes.

Note the boy sailor, seated at table.

Closer to home a scare that had developed over Japanese land purchases in Mexico were abating.

It seemed pretty clear that the early scare, which had been that the Japanese were buying up strategic lands in Baja California were more than a little off base.

A U.S. Senator predicted a future war on the Pacific, however. . . .

Overall, frankly, the news of this early stage of the peace was, well, not very peaceful.