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2 | www.sill.armymwr.com World War I One hundred years ago, the United States reluctantly entered World War I, which tipped the power balance and was a decisive moment for democracy. Two million Americans volunteered for the Army, and close to three million were draed. For the first time, women were in the ranks, and over 350,000 African Americans served in the military. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans migrated north to work in factories and nearly one million women joined the workforce as the United States mobilized to produce weapons, equipment, munitions and supplies. e "Great War" shaped a legacy in medicine, technology, politics and a new way of life. Did You Know... • Wilfred Owen was unknown at the end of the war. Wilfred Owen is one of the best known poets of WWI, but when he died on the frontline, just a week before the end of the war, he was relatively unknown. At the time, his view of the war as one of pity and horror was in the minority. It wasn't until the 1960s that a literary elite decided this was the most authentic view of the conflict because it chimed with their own anti- war feelings. is resulted in the publication of two key war poetry anthologies which heavily featured Owen. • WWI sparked the invention of plastic surgery. Shrapnel was the cause of many facial injuries in WWI. Horrified by the injuries he saw, surgeon Harold Gillies took on the task of helping victims and pioneered early techniques of facial reconstruction in the process. • An explosion on the battlefield in France was heard in London. A group of miners, operating in total secrecy, dug tunnels up to 100 feet underground to plant and detonate mines beneath the enemy's trenches. eir biggest success was at Messines Ridge in Belgium where over 900,000 pounds of explosives were simultaneously detonated in 19 underground tunnels. Much of the German front line was destroyed, and the explosions were heard 140 miles away by the British prime minister. Finish reading 12 Amazing WWI Facts at You Probably Don't Know at www.bbc.co.uk/ history/0/26936615. Learn more about World War I through fiction and non-fiction books and movies at Nye Library! We recommend these book titles as a starting point: • e Daughters of Mars by omas Keneally • To Hell and Back by Sydney Loch • Storm of Steel by Ernst Juenger • All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque Remember WWI Remember WWI