The National World War I Memorial in the Nation’s Capital is Now a Reality

In December 2014, President Obama signed legislation authorizing the World War I Centennial Commission (WWICC) to establish a new memorial in our nation’s capital. Just six years later, on April 16, 2021, the WWICC, in partnership with the National Park Service, the American Battle Monuments Commission and the Doughboy Foundation, raised the flag of the United States of America over the new National World War I Memorial.

Finally, the millions of Americans who left their homes to deploy to a country most had never visited, who fought in a war they did not start, and who were willing to die for peace and liberty for people they did not know, are honored at this magnificent spot in our nation’s capital.

In 1981 the Pershing Park site was dedicated as the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) Memorial and erected by the American Battle Monuments Commission in honor of the AEF and their commander (and ABMC’s first chairman) General John Pershing. The original AEF Memorial remains in the southeast corner of the memorial. The walls flanking the Pershing statue bear text reciting the accomplishments of the AEF and a tribute from General Pershing to his troops, as well as battle maps of the Western Front and the Meuse-Argonne offensive, the largest battle of American troops in the war, which culminated in the Armistice on Nov. 11, 1918.

As part of the rededication of Pershing Park as the National World War I Memorial, new commemorative elements are being added. In addition to the central sculpture A Soldier’s Journey, the new elements include, on the reverse of the sculpture, the Peace Fountain, a cascade of water behind an excerpt from the poem “The Young Dead Soldiers Do Not Speak” by Archibald MacLeish. The poem is a call to peace to give meaning to the sacrifice of those killed in the war. (MacLeish was a U.S. artillery officer during World War I, and later librarian of Congress and three-time Pulitzer Prize winner. His brother died in the war and is buried at Flanders Field American Cemetery.)

The belvedere, located at the northeast corner of the memorial, bears a series of interpretive panels. In the center of the belvedere is a medallion depicting an allegorical figure of victory, as portrayed on the medals awarded to members of the AEF and other Allied forces. Inscribed along the front of the belvedere are the names of the major campaigns for which Army and Navy units were awarded battle streamers.

President Woodrow Wilson led the United States into World War I with his famous call to Congress in April 1917: “The world must be made safe for democracy.” The inscription here comes from a speech Wilson gave two years later, on Memorial Day 1919, after the war was over and America and its Allies victorious. Speaking at Suresnes American Cemetery outside Paris (the first overseas U.S. military cemetery), Wilson articulated America’s altruistic motivations for entering the war, and an idealism that would influence American foreign policy for the next 100 years.

The final element is a pair of quotations inscribed in planter boxes on the north side of the park. One, from Willa Cather’s World War I novel “One of Ours,” is a testament to the achievements and sacrifices of American armed forces in the war. The other, from Alta May Andrews of the Army Nurse Corps, speaks of her own pride in having a chance to serve, and more broadly for the contributions of all marginalized American citizens – women, African Americans, Native Americans, immigrants and other minorities – to the American war effort.

For more information, please visit https://firstcolors.worldwar1centennial.org/ from which this article is based.

Blake Hyfield is the post service officer for the local VFW and American Legion posts. He can be reached at bhpegleg@yahoo.com.