The Observation Deck

My 10th grade students are working on a unit that considers World War One from both a global and local perspective. In their History class, the students are going to look at the Great War from a global perspective. In my American Literature class, we've decided to do a research paper based on the experiences of those Lakewoodites who lost their lives in the service of our country. Using information from a Lakewood Public Library web page (http://www.lkwdpl.org/mtn/firstwc.htm), my students are hoping to improve the library's web page by including a broader perspective on the war as it impacted Lakewood, photographs of the young men, their houses as they exist today, and a photograph of the soldiers' final resting place (via Skype sessions with French High School students living near the foreign graveyards).

So far we have enlisted the help of The Lakewood Alumni Foundation and the reference department at Lakewood Public Library. We are wondering if anyone has any leads on additional information about life in Lakewood during World War One. We are also interested in anything we can find about the effect of The Great Influenza of 1918 (The Spanish Flu) on our community.

Thank you in advance for any help that you can offer our students.

I suggest:

Europe’s Last Summer Who Started The Great War in 1914 by Fromkin:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m ... n15378557/

There is also a book in the Library with a similar title about the year before the war started. I thought it was titled Europe’s Last Summer, but I can’t seem to find any reference to it. It must not have been very popular although I thought it was great.

One item of interest about the influenza epidemic was that it left many of its victims “frozen”. They were alive but could not move or speak. A few years after the war a treatment was found that “cured” the victims. Influenza victims who were treated were able to walk and talk. Unfortunately the affect was only temporary. Within a few weeks the victims became frozen again. Think of that and that war when you think times are tough.

Another avenue to explore is the racism and anti-Semitism that existed during the period. Adolf Hitler’s ideas were not new.

One item to debate: What if the US stayed neutral and Germany won? How different would the world be?

One more thought: While the political leadership was mostly hesitant about starting the war the people were all for it.

From Kipling:

“If any question why we died/ Tell them, because our fathers lied”.

I like this one:

Have You News of my Boy Jack?


"Have you news of my boy Jack?"
Not this tide.
"When d'you think that he'll come back?"
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.
"Has any one else had word of him?"
Not this tide.
For what is sunk will hardly swim,
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.
"Oh, dear, what comfort can I find?"
None this tide,
Nor any tide,
Except he did not shame his kind -
Not even with that wind blowing, and that tide.
Then hold your head up all the more,
This tide,
And every tide;
Because he was the son you bore,
And gave to that wind blowing and that tide.

If any of your students have too much time on their hands they might want to check out the newer release of WWI poetry available at the library.

Excellent posting Bill!

I would add that they should look at a few other pieces of period literature/poetry, including Alan Seeger's "I have a Rendezvous With Death", and also "In Flander's Fields", written probably by John McCrae, a Canadian doctor.

By the way, Alan Seeger's brother Charles, was a musicologist. Alan's untimely death in that war no doubt profoundly affected the Seeger family, along with so many others, of course. Charles' son, (and Alan's nephew) Pete Seeger, is the famous folk-singing banjo player who, among his many other interests, still tries, even in his 90's, to unify people in a divided world.

Back to my own banjo. That struggle for unity continues. Now, more than ever...

Check THIS out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hM8QK4oM3Jk

Thank you for the posts, gentlemen.

We will certainly look into the poetry collection, as well as the poem included in your post, Bill.

In my research last night, I learned that the local Boy Scout troop helped to burn down the offices of the German language newspaper here in town. I also found that a teacher at LHS was suspended for false accusations of "humanizing the Germans" and that German language classes were suspended at LHS during the war!

The kids are currently going out and taking photos of the houses listed on the library site, and we hope to find a few period pictures of these houses as well. One student has already located the burial plots of Lakewood's dead in France, and we are going to contact a local French high school to see if they'd send some students out to snap a few photos of their final resting place.

We're really interested in how Lakewood dealt with the conflux of the war and the flu here at home. I understand that the schools were closed for a time, as well. If anyone has any accounts of the effect on the war at home, any ideas about where we can dig up more archival info (newspapers, hospital records, mortality rates, etc.) that would be great. I also wonder if there were any artistic responses here at home. We have also found that the Templar Auto company factory switched over to making ammunition for the war.

I'll keep everyone posted as we progress. The kids and I are very excited about all that we've found in a mere two days. Keep it coming folks. A sub-lesson for this project is our use of social networks, digital archives, and communication technology to do research. We will be checking in on this forum from time to time in class, as we continue to track down sources and leads.

Go Lakewood!

Sean, I have no advice to give but I wanted to give you kudos on being an awesome teacher. This sounds like a wonderful project you are working on with your students, a great way for them to immerse themselves in history. I am sure they will learn a ton and I hope the information they get will stay with them through the years.

This is an excerpt from an email I received today. I'm posting it here so that my students and others can follow these links, and as a way to use this forum as a repository of useful leads.

Thanks Danielle, Gary, Mary, and Bill for your support. Keep it coming, Lakewood!

We found the census to be useful. When I was at Lakewood, we had some census rolls for Ohio. At Fairview, we have a subscription to both Ancestry.com and Heritage Quest. Anyone with a CCPL library card can use Heritage Quest remotely to view the census records. You can also access the Historical New York Times database via our website for digital images of the newspaper from that time period. We also subscribe to Footnote and the Sanborn Fire Maps. Here’s a link to a few of our genealogy databases. We subscribe to many others.

http://wfxsearch.webfeat.org/clients/wf ... oken=68152

The Cleveland Memory Project is great for photos.

http://www.clevelandmemory.org/

The Plain Dealer is not indexed for that time period, but you can access part of the Newsbank index and then go to the microfilms.

http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Arc ... on=keyword

The city directories are useful. I think Lakewood still has a large collection of Lakewood directories.

Of course, there are many books in the library related to WWI and Spanish Influenza, but it takes some digging to find the local angle.

Hope this is helpful to you. Let me know if you have any questions.

Mary Ryan
Adult Services Librarian
Fairview Park Branch
Cuyahoga County Public Library

Sean Wheeler wrote:In my research last night, I learned that the local Boy Scout troop helped to burn down the offices of the German language newspaper here in town. I also found that a teacher at LHS was suspended for false accusations of "humanizing the Germans" and that German language classes were suspended at LHS during the war!

!

That is a little known aspect of WWI.

If you want to stir things up:

http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opi ... -coop.html

Another place to look into census information and what not is the mormon church in Westlake. I've done a bit of genealogy over the years and I can recommend the church and not just because I am a member. Anyhow they are very helpful and have a lot of good information.

25000 Westwood Rd
Westlake, Ohio
Phone: 440-777-1518
Hours: T-Sat 10am-2pm; T-Th 6pm-9pm
Closed: Sunday and Monday, Closed on all Holidays and Nov 26&27, Dec 19 thru Jan 3, 2011

Sean---- Good job in what sounds like a fantastic project! I particularly like how you are taking a topic from "ancient history" and using modern techniques, such as the Deck and Skype to help in your class's investigation.

At the moment I can't help in any of your requests. Although, like Danielle, something might quickly pop into my head.

Here's a suggestion, though. You can see already the interest you have generated amongst us somewhat recent high school grads! Maybe the results of your class's work could be presented so that we might all learn from it?

Stan

Thanks Stan.

I was thinking that perhaps we could present at the library once we have submitted our work for the improvement of the site. I absolutely plan to keep everyone here updated with what we find and I'll look into a way that we can share our final product with people as well.

Today we had one of Lakewood's all-time greats teach our class. Terry Walker, one of the most incredible people I have ever met and a recently retired LHS teacher, took some time out of his day to come in and share his wealth of knowledge about a few of the major battles of the war. Personally, I missed having Mr. Walker when I went to LHS, so this was a great opportunity for me to watch an amazing teacher at work. More to come....

Hello everyone and thank you for all of the help thus far. The students are really getting into the research and are just now starting to track down leads and make use of the contacts that have been offered to us.

IN particular, we are looking for any information on Lucy Lang Sekerka. She was the person who put together the "More Than Names" collection at the Lakewood Public Library, and we would be interested in any contact information that might be out there.