1918

Articles from 1918

The American Army Occupies Coblenz, Germany (The Stars and Stripes, 1918)

On the afternoon of December 8, 1918, the troops of the Third American Army entered Koblenz. This was the goal of the occupation. The Yankees had reached the Rhine.

Probably never in all its stressful history did enemy troops enter it so in quite the matter-of-fact manner which marked the American entry last Sunday. There was no band. There were no colors. ‘We’re just going in sort of casual like,’ one of our generals had said the day before, and he was right.

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Jascha Heifetz’ First New York Recital (Vanity Fair, 1918)

Here is an enthusiastic review of Jascha Heifetz’ (1900 – 1987) first Carnegie Hall performance. The journalist relays how fully loaded the concert hall seemed to be with the finest violinists in the Western world all sitting in rapt attention; and how joyously they all applauded following his first number:

Here, mark you, were the masters of the guild giving an ovation to a slim, eighteen year-old boy and acknowledging him as one of the master violinists of the world.

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A Trench Coat for the Fashionable Ladies (Harper’s Bazaar, 1918)

Attached, you will find one of the first elegant, elongated fashion figure drawings to depict the trench coat as an element of feminine mode. Although this drawing first appeared in a Harper’s Bazaar fashion editorial recommending the coat as one of the better private purchase uniform items that could be worn by an American woman in one of the auxiliary units, it is clear that the fashion potential of the garment was not lost on the magazine’s editors or anyone else on this side of the Atlantic. This particular one was produced in far nicer fabric than was made available for the men. The acquaintance between the trench coat and American fashion designers has remained a strong one ever since.


To see other examples of war’s influence on fashion, click here.

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How the Furnace of War Made the Wrist Watch a Musculine Fashion Accessory (The Stars and Stripes, 1918)

The following article must have been penned as a result of some sort of creative writing project for one of the many bored World War One Doughboys waiting for the boat home. The article spells out how the necessities of modern war demanded that the wrist watch no longer be thought of as a piece of jewelery adorned only by fops and fems and evolved into a useful tool for soldiers on the field. The column makes clear that prior the Great War, any man who dared to accessorize themselves with a watch was immediately suspect and likely to have their noses broken.

The T-shirt also had a military origin. Click here to read the article

•Read an article about the history of Brooks Brothers•

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