These 1917 rookies march in Grant Park with the Art Institute in the background. At hastily erected recruiting stations, civilians began their transformation into fighting men during World War I.
War still seemed a long way from reality at Fort Sheridan in the fall of 1917 as an instructor in military tactics from France, Capt. G. E. Bertrand, from left, outlines his experiences and schools new allies Maj. Berkely Merchant and Lt. R. Smalley.
Inductees do morning limbering exercises at Fort Sheridan in May 1917.
Some of the first young men departing Chicago for army training camp got these farewells in the spring of 1917. Not long afterward, they were en route to France with the 33rd Division to help stem the German advance.
Doughboys march in Chicago in support of Liberty Loans during World War I in an undated photo.
The 7th Illinois infantry in Chicago during World War I in an undated photo.
Soldiers load a 3-inch gun at Fort Sheridan on Nov. 20, 1917, in preparation for heading to France during World War I.
The Naval Station Great Lakes band marches through Chicago’s Loop at the start of the U.S. involvement in World War I in 1917.
In Chicago as in the rest of the nation, women watched their men leave for the battlefields of France in 1917, and each wondered: Will he come back again? Editors note: This print has been partially handpainted.
A section of the Illinois 2nd Field Artillery camp at Camp Logan in Houston in 1917 during World War I.
World War I parade in Chicago in 1917.
There were thousands of scenes like this one in Union Depot as soldiers left for World War I in 1917.
The 2nd Infantry, from Chicago, now a part of the 33rd Division at Camp Logan in Houston in 1917.
Floyd Gibbons, right, during World War I in 1918. Gibbons was a Chicago Tribune war correspondent.
Nurse Isabella Gibbons sits next to her husband, Floyd, at Base Hospital No. 1 in France in 1918. Floyd Gibbons was shot in the eye during World War I, when he worked as a war correspondent for the Chicago Tribune.
Gold Star Mothers walk in a Liberty Loan parade in downtown Chicago during World War I.
Soldiers march in Chicago during World War I in 1918.
A Chicago Motor Bus is parked outside Swift Elementary School in the Edgewater neighborhood advertising Liberty Bonds during World War I in 1918.
A Liberty Loan parade is held in Chicago during World War I.
Chicago schoolchildren at Swift Elementary School held a Liberty Bond parade during a 1918 war bond drive, with the German Kaiser as the enemy.
The Chicago chapter of the Red Cross Canteen with wounded soldiers on Jan. 1, 1919. The canteen was located in Grant Park. More than 100 wounded men from the war in France arrived in Chicago on Jan. 1, 1919, for a short (several-hour) stay at the Red Cross Canteen before they were sent to reconstruction hospitals. Most men had bullet wounds or had been gassed and burned. The men were entertained with music and food and treated like heroes while they stayed at the canteen, according to the Tribune. Several of the men were from Chicago.
A view of the Illinois hospital camp on the lakefront in Chicago during World War I in an undated photo.
Elizabeth Channon, of the Red Cross, helps wounded soldiers Mozart R. Nichols and Joseph Jackson off a truck Jan. 1, 1919, in Chicago. The Chicago chapter of the Red Cross Canteen was located in Grant Park. More than 100 wounded men from the war in France arrived in Chicago on that day for a short stay at the Red Cross Canteen before they were sent to reconstruction hospitals. Most men had bullet wounds or had been gassed and burned. The men were entertained with music and food and treated like heroes while they stayed there, according to the Tribune. Several of the men were from Chicago.
The Liberty Loan booth at Marshall Field’s store in an undated photo during World War I.
A Liberty Loan parade is held in downtown Chicago on Oct. 13, 1918, during World War I.
Red Cross Canteen volunteers entertain wounded soldiers Jan. 1, 1919, after the soldiers arrived from France for a short stay on their way to reconstruction hospitals. Mrs. Harmon A. Harris, Mrs. Maurice Rosenwald, Mrs. Earl McKnight (playing piano) and Mrs. Virgil Webster played the piano and sang for the soldiers at the canteen in Grant Park. The original caption that ran in the Tribune on Jan. 2, 1919, said: “Gee! But it’s great to be a hero. Men invalided home from France entertained in Chicago at the Red Cross Canteen while they wait for trains to take them to reconstruction hospitals.” Many of the soldiers, some from Chicago, had bullet wounds or had been gassed and burned.
The young men of the 33rd Division, most from Chicago and Illinois, arrive in Hoboken, N.J., on the USS Charleston at the end of World War I in 1919. “The 33d division has a nickname, a distinguishing insignia, and a rattling reputation. In the States they called us the ‘Prairie division.’ Over here we are the ‘Yellow Cross division.’ When we shall again shake hands with the Goddess of Liberty and shall again smell that familiar smell of the Chicago stockyards, we shall once more be the ‘Prairie division,’ ” wrote the Tribune on May 18, 1919.
The Army transport Mount Vernon is greeted by the Illinois reception committee during World War I in an undated photo.
Men of the 152nd Infantry, formerly the Illinois National Guard, look on May 17, 1919, while arriving in New York on the Army transport Mount Vernon. “On Monday and Tuesday 10,400 troops will entrain for Chicago. They will go in twenty-one trains, which will leave Camp Mills (in New York) at intervals of one hour. It will take from fifteen to twenty hours to assemble them for the parade. Chicago, prepare for some parade!” wrote the Tribune on May 22, 1919.
Arrival of the 130th Infantry (of the 33rd Division) on the USS Siboney as it arrives in Hoboken, N.J. The men were marching aboard the ferry headed to camp. “The steamship Siboney nosed into New York harbor late tonight bringing more than 3,000 Illinois men back to happiness and home,” wrote the Tribune on May 20, 1919. “It will dock at Hoboken tomorrow morning at 9:30 o’clock. On board the vessel is the 130th infantry, in command of Col. John V. Clinnin, and everybody in Chicago knows Clinnin was a major in the old Illinois 1st.”
The 33rd Division arrives at the station in Chicago in an undated photo. “Nothing short of the greatest reception ever given returning troops would be worthy of the men in the 33d division,” declared Bishop Thomas Nicholson of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
The first to see the homecoming of troops from World War I in 1919, as they came into Chicago.
Marching from the USS Siboney to chow in Hoboken, N.J. The soldiers would then travel to Illinois by train to get home.
Home to Chicago from World War I, a soldier of the Black Hawk Division receives a time-honored welcome on Jan. 15, 1919.
Men from the 131st Infantry of the 33rd Division from Illinois after disembarking in 1919 at the end of World War I.
The homecoming of the 33rd Division as the soldiers march down Michigan Avenue in the spring of 1919. “The sun was on the lake. The sun was shining on Michigan avenue. Chicago’s imposing skyline was before them, white and gray and black and brown and red buildings all down the line; palisades that were filled with caves, and in each cave men and women with flags and white arms that waved welcome,” wrote the Tribune on May 28, 1919.
Maj. Gen. George Bell Jr., left, marches at the front of the homecoming parade for the 33rd Division in Chicago in May 1919.
The 33rd Division parades down LaSalle Street in Chicago’s Loop in the spring of 1919 at the end of World War I. “These are not boys. These are men. The war had mellowed them. They are tired men, brave men, happy men. They want to be boys again. But it can never be,” said Col. Clinnin of the 130th Infantry (33rd Division) at his headquarters at Camp Mills, according to a Tribune report a day after the big parade, May 28, 1919. The Tribune wrote: “But they looked like boys yesterday and they acted like boys. They put their arms around their mothers, and cried, some of them. They swung along the streets greedy to see all there was to see, not soldiers now, not veterans of the world’s most terrible war, simply boys back home with their own again — and nothing else mattered.” Editor’s note: The glass plate negative used to produce this photograph is broken.
The 803rd Infantry, with African-American troops, marches in an undated photo. The Tribune wrote on July 20, 1919, “Chicagoans in the 803d Pioneer infantry (colored) went wild today with glee when informed that they would leave the army base at Norfolk on the morning of July 22 for Camp Grant and home. The men came in last night on the transport Philippines, fourteen days out from Brest. They were commanded by Lieut. Adler, regular army, and had seen hard labor at the front, and behind the lines in France.” Editors note: The glass plate negative used to produce this photograph is broken.
A welcome of flowers and cheers greeted doughboys as they paraded up Michigan Avenue in 1919 at the end of World War I. “They were home,” wrote the Tribune on May 28, 1919. “They were on Michigan avenue, the dream street, the mirage made real.”
The 33rd Division parade in an undated photo. “There was no doubt of the sincerity of yesterday’s welcome. It was more than the men expected. It brought tears to some of their eyes. It was magnificent. It was wonderful. It was history. The second biggest city in the land ran all over itself to greet them. There was no traffic to speak of in the busiest district in the world, the Chicago Loop, while they were marching,” wrote the Tribune in 1919.
The 108th Engineering Division marches through Grant Park during the soldiers’ homecoming parade in 1919. “Chicago yelled its head off. Chicago shouted to colonels and majors and captains and privates and second lieutenants and non-coms and orderlies. Chicago whistled and roared and cheered, and rang bells and beat gongs, and blew horns, and threw flowers, and tickled smiling doughboys under their chins with blue feathers on which was the printed message, ‘We’re tickled to death to see you,’ ” wrote the Tribune on May 28, 1919.
