A New Decade

A new decade arrived on January 1st 1928 new president Warren G Harding, would soon take his oath of office. As the 1920s and 1930s progressed, the ripples created by the Great War acted more like Great Waves from a boulder dropped into a small pond. The world would never be the same. America's losses in the Great War as tragic as they were couldn't compare with the all of Europe's. Over half of all Frenchmen between age 20 and 32 had died; 35 of German men between 19 and 22 were dead. And Europe large civilian populations were homeless and continue to migrate. Starvation and death during the early 1920s was a part of this huge migration. The US and other countries led enormous relief efforts with food and clothing. In Alaska the federal government got back its flavor Forest to complete the construction of the Alaskan Railroad. In April 1923 as Seward prepared for President Harding visit to Alaska to celebrate the completion of the railroad, the local American Legion Post changed its name to Seward Post Number 5 (eliminating Isaac Evans name) informed in American Legion Auxiliary for the wives and other female relatives of veterans. 'In times of change," Longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer wrote, "learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists." Everything was different, especially for returning soldiers and their families. The men were not the same in some ways - and much the same in ways that may not have been noticed before. A poem called militarism reborn by Edward hope US Navy reprinted from the New York Evening Sun on January 11th 1919, Literary Digest - takes a humorous if not cynical approach. Parts of the poem go like: 'When she knew him For the few short weeks Before he went across His face was so brown And his eyes were so bright, And he was so straight and muscular, And his uniform was so perfect, With his little gold bars on the shoulders And heavily embroidered wings over his heart And the shiny puttees - He was so much the man and the soldier That she forgot that the war was Going to end some day And she went and married him." But after her soldier-husband came home and stored his uniform in the closet, she learned that 'He had his haircut round from choice And he liked silk shirts With broad red and purple stripes Or purple dots the size of mothballs..." He wore "yellow shoes with bumpy toes And green bright hats And vivid suits." She learned that he smoked cigars and that he said 'He don't" and "You was." The poem ends: 'So now she sits at home In the house her father pays for, While Charlie punishes an adding-machine, And she prays fervently For more Wars." Ironically, her prayers would be soon answered...