April 6, 1917, promised to be a warm day in Primgihar, Iowa, and for Everett Scott it was a day to turn his attention to his two main interests--farming and Louise, the girl he hoped to marry someday if he could only convince her father, a stern man. He watched his high-spirited brother Leslie leave for school, then turned his attention to chores.
In Bessemer, Alabama, Joe Romano was enjoying being back home from a year's duty with the Alabama National Guard on the Mexican border. the old Fourth Alabama--the "Bloody 4th" of Civil War Confederate fame--had answered the president's call-up of the guard to protect American territory and citizens from the Mexican banditos. Now the great adventure of his life was finished, and Romano contemplated whether or not to sign up for another hitch with the Alabama Guard.
Dodge City, Kansas, was similar to Primgihar, Iowa, and Bessemer, Alabama, in that the day started out quiet enough, as befits small-town America. For Calvin Lambert, a recent graduate of Kansas State University, the prospects for a solid future were definitely there, because he had a job with the local newspaper and had attracted the attention of the renowned editor, William Allen White. Lambert realized the import of President Woodrow Wilson's April 2nd message to Congress asking for a declaration of war against Germany. Certainly, Lambert thought, America's contribution would be heavy--her farm produce and her industry might be enough to sustain the allied troops in the field.
In Washington, D.C., Major Douglas MacArthur, serving on the American General Staff, recognized that Europe wanted more than just produce and machinery. Europe would need men to fill its dangerously depleted ranks, and if America was forthcoming, U.S. soldiers would then go to France. MacArthur wanted to be among those soldiers sent to do battle in this great world war. Major MacArthur lived in the shadow of his father, General Arthur MacArthur. On 25 November 1863, Captain Arthur MacArthur seized the flag of the 24th Wisconsin Infantry and led the regiment up Missionary Ridge, winning . . .
