Armistice
The front page of the Akron Beacon Journal on Armistice Day, November 11, 1918.
The Akron Beacon Journal announces the 146th Regiment’s celebrated return to Ohio.
This Wooster Daily Republican article describes the festivities of July 4, 1919, as Wayne County welcomed home its enlisted men.
Emmett Dix, editor of the Wooster Daily Republican, awoke to the sound of his telephone ringing at 2:30a.m. on November 11, 1918. The Allies had finally signed an armistice with Germany, and Dix was the first man in Wooster to hear about it. By 4:00a.m., news of the Allied victory had spread through the entire town.1 The bells of the courthouse rang continuously throughout the day. Schools and factories were closed. At 8:00am the first parade took place, and the streets remained flooded with jubilant townsfolk until after midnight.2
The war had taken its toll on Wayne County. Seventy of the county’s enlisted men were killed overseas. Nearly one hundred civilians had died of Spanish Flu since September. Even as they mourned those they had lost, however, Woosterites looked forward to the happy return of nearly 1,500 soldiers, welcoming them home on July 4, 1919 with two bands, parades, fireworks, and an extravagant banquet. The Wooster Daily Republican asked, “With the mammoth crowd, the good music, the races, the rabbit show, the dirigible balloon, and the fireworks display, who is there that can say Wayne County’s homecoming celebration was not a brilliant success?”1
1 Armistice with Germany was signed at 5A.M. November 11 in Paris, or 11P.M. the previous day in Wooster. It went into effect at 11A.M. Paris time. <br2 Hauenstein, 198.
3 “Great Throng Participates in Wayne County’s Welcome Home,” the Wooster Daily Republican, July 5, 1919.