THE HOMEFRONT Life in the US during WWI

THE HOMEFRONT Life in the US during WWI

GREAT MIGRATION • Henry Ford and others recruit African Americans from the South • 300, 000 – 500, 000 African Americans migrate to northern cities • Able to vote and affect policies of northern politicians

MEXICAN AMERICANS HEAD NORTH • Wartime labor shortage convinced many Mexicans to head north • 100, 000 Mexicans migrated into the Southwest, providing labor farmers and ranchers • Faced discrimination, generally settled in their own neighborhoods

PRESIDENT WILSON “SELLING” THE WAR • Committee on Public Information (CPI) • Recruited motion picture companies to help sway public opinion in favor of war • Distributed short patriotic speeches to theaters and public places • Urged people to buy war bonds and report draft dodgers to authorities

SELLING THE WAR • Committee on Public Information (CPI) • Recruited motion picture companies to help sway public opinion in favor of war • Distributed short patriotic speeches to theaters and public places • Urged people to buy war bonds and report draft dodgers to authorities

CIVIL LIBERTIES CURTAILED • Espionage – spying to acquire government information • Espionage Act of 1917 • illegal to aid the enemy, give false reports, or interfere with the war effort • Sedition Act of 1918 • Illegal to speak out against the war publicly

SELECTIVE SERVICE AND VOLUNTEERS • Required all men between 21 and 30 to register for draft • Lottery randomly determined the order in which men had to report to local draft boards in charge of selecting or exempting people from military service • 2. 8 million Americans were drafted • 2 million Americans volunteered

WOMEN JOIN THE MILITARY • First war women officially served in armed forces – though only in non-combatant positions • Navy authorized women to enlist for clerical needs • Army allowed women to serve in Army Nursing Corps • Army nurses only women sent overseas during war • 10, 000 went to Europe

TRENCH WARFARE a form of land warfare using occupied fighting lines consisting largely of trenches, in which troops are significantly protected from the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery

DEVELOPMENT • Machine guns and long-range artillery made advancing the front line more difficult • Trenches began as temporary defensive positions for battles, like foxholes. • Trench system grows to become primary attack system of WWI

NEW TECHNOLOGY • Germans began to use poison gas • British introduced primitive armored tanks • First time aircraft was used in war

THE WAR IS HERE. • Push desks to the walls. Two lines of desks stood up with the legs pointed inward. • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=Mte 1 MZp. F 5 Ig

SILENCE AND FIGHTING

DISCUSSION • What did the experience feel like? What if the weapons were real and your life was actually on the line? • What do you think was the worst aspect of the trenches for WWI soldiers and why?

DISCUSSION • Based on what you learned about life in the war from this activity, what do you imagine life for a soldier after the war would have been like? • Despite the hardships of time in the trenches, why was it a useful battle tool?

Groping along the tunnel, step by step, He winked his prying torch with patching glare From side to side, and sniffed the unwholesome air. Tins, boxes, bottles, shapes too vague to know, A mirror smashed, the mattress from a bed; And he, exploring fifty feet below The rosy gloom of battle overhead.

Tripping, he grabbed the wall; saw someone lie Humped at his feet, half-hidden by a rug, And stooped to give the sleeper's arm a tug. "I'm looking for headquarters. " No reply. "God blast your neck!" (For days he'd had no sleep. ) "Get up and guide me through this stinking place. "

Savage, he kicked a soft, unanswering heap, And flashed his beam across the livid face Terribly glaring up, whose eyes yet wore Agony dying hard ten days before; And fists of fingers clutched a blackening wound. Alone he staggered on until he found Dawn's ghost that filtered down a shafted stair To the dazed, muttering creatures underground Who hear the boom of shells in muffled sound.

At last, with sweat of horror in his hair, He climbed through darkness to the twilight air, Unloading hell behind him step by step.

PEACE • 2 million U. S. troops sent to Europe • German troops tried to conquer Paris but were stopped by American & French troops • Americans launched a strong attack, broke German defenses, & caused them to retreat • On November 11, 1918, Germany signed an armistice (an agreement to stop fighting)