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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (April 8, 2017)
LIFESTYLES WEEKEND, APRIL 8-9, 2017 Pendleton’s reaction to the U.S. entry into World War I a century ago T his week, on April 6, Americans mark an important milestone: the 100th anniversary of the U.S. entrance into what was then known as the “World War.” This event forever changed the United States, but it can seem like so much ancient history — unless you take time to discover how it played out in your hometown. Then as now, Pendletonians will fi nd that the East Oregonian was on the scene to write a detailed and colorful fi rst draft of history. Legendary Brigit editor Edwin Farley Burton Aldrich Comment was in his seventh year at the helm of the EO in 1917. He understood the signifi cance of this fi rst global confl ict when it was only distant thunder here. Aldrich fed Pendleton readers a steady diet of war news from August 1914, from straight reporting on big events like the Lusitania sinking to human-interest stories, such as the fi rst write-up of what became known as the Christmas Truce of 1914. He cleverly included war-related features in high-volume special editions like the Round-Up souvenir insert, highlighting items with a local angle, like British and French purchases of war horses from area stockmen. Like his president, Woodrow Wilson, Aldrich initially believed that U.S. should remain neutral. “It is not our war,” he would say, declaring that the U.S. ought to get rich selling its goods to all comers and position itself as an honest broker for the postwar. But he clearly felt that while Pendletonians might not be interested in war, war might well be interested in them. He wanted them to be ready in case the confl ict extended a deadly hand. War did indeed come to the U.S. in April 1917. After a long series of German provocations — attacks on U.S. shipping, civilian deaths, German intrigues with Mexico — President Woodrow Wilson had had enough. In a speech before Congress, he announced that the U.S. would “make the world safe for democracy” in joining the confl ict on the side of the British and French. Aldrich immediately got behind his president and began coordinating and chronicling the community’s response. The EO announced plans for a huge patriotic rally and parade, which involved every civic organization in town. Readers learned that Pendleton High School students were responding with alacrity. Younger boys hastened to guard the wheat fi elds from the German saboteurs everyone expected, and the girls formed a chapter of the Girls National Honor Guard, a group that promoted patriotism. Aldrich urged Pendletonians to begin conserving food and hired the Umatilla County extension agent to help readers with weekly tips. Of course, the spotlight shone brightest on those tasked with doing the fi ghting. Readers already knew of Pendleton native Joe Despain, who had gone north to join the Canadian Army in 1916 and was already demonstrating his battlefi eld bona fi des. Buckaroo athletic standouts Sheldon Ulrich and Clell Brown announced they would forgo the remainder of the PHS spring sports season to join the Marines, who as ever promised the toughest training and combat assignments. Pendleton’s bron- co-busters, ranch hands and adven- turers, led by Round-Up heroes Lee Caldwell and Dell Blancett, stepped up to form their own cavalry unit, Oregon National Guard Troop D. Reminiscent of Teddy Roosevelt’s Rough Riders, they posed tough and unsmiling for the EO prior to their departure for training camp. The draft would soon pull in many more area residents, including local rancher Robert Ingalls and Manuel Monese, the son of an Echo-based Portuguese immigrant. ABOVE: A commemorative Round-Up edition of the East Oregonian in 1917 celebrates the calvary unit that trained in Pendleton during World War I. LEFT: In this Sept. 26, 1918 fi le photo, a U.S. Army 37-mm gun crew man their position during the World War One Meuse- Argonne Allied offensive in France. AP fi le photo Grover Minthorn, Isaac Patrick and other Umatilla Indian Reservation comrades would also join the fi ght, serving with white soldiers. Famed Round-Up competitor George Fletcher hoped to form up with his pals in Troop D, but soon learned that he and other African-Ameri- cans would have to be content with bringing democracy to Europe in segregated units. Once the troops were on their way, Aldrich used his editorial bully pulpit to maximum advan- tage. He began to teach readers how to think about the war. Where before he pronounced a pox on the houses of all the combatants, he now made the Germans the villains-in-chief, Kaiser Wilhelm becoming the “Potsdam viper” and his troops “mad dogs.” Pendleton readers learned that they now could return an historic favor to France: as France had helped the U.S. win its revolutionary war, so the U.S. would liberate France from the Kaiser and his henchmen. At the same time, Aldrich took a tough stand against anyone harboring doubts about the war. He declared in one of his fi rst wartime editorials that “the time for discussion is over.” It was now everyone’s solemn obligation to support President Wilson and the troops. Aldrich soon began calling out dissenters near and far. When maverick Wisconsin senator Bob LaFollette offered an early peace plan that President Wilson rejected, he became “Herr La Follette,” the “Senator from Germany” in the EO. In Pendleton, a man warning teenagers on Main Street that war wasn’t all romance and derring-do landed on the EO front page after his arrest for “disparaging the Army.” Aldrich instinctively recognized the power of his newspaper in wartime and would use it shrewdly in the months to come, reporting, educating and enforcing the offi cial line on the war. The declaration of war 100 years ago represented just the beginning of a major national effort to get an army up, running and overseas. Umatilla County and Pendleton would send more than 1,000 men and women to Europe to help Great Britain and France defeat the Central Powers, and their deployment would give rise to some controversial developments on the home front. E.B. Aldrich stood ready with his knowledge, convictions and East Oregonian to shape as well as report on all of them. ■ Brigit Farley is a Pendleton resi- dent and professor at Washington State University-Richland.
