By Theodore John

This year, on Nov. 11, while preparing to set up for the Armistice Day Remembrance at the World War I Memorial and Museum in Kansas City, Mo., I was reminded of why the monument was built. 

World War I ended on Nov. 11, 1918. The groundbreaking for the monument occurred on Nov. 1, 1921, three years after the war ended. The finished monument was dedicated on Nov. 11, 1926, by President Calvin Coolidge, in the presence of Queen Marie of Romania.

Coolidge announced that the memorial “…has not been raised to commemorate war and victory, but rather the results of war and victory which are embodied in peace and liberty … .” World War I was originally called the “War to End All Wars.” The world was actively unified in seeking peace. So much so that in 1928, The US Secretary of State, Frank Kellogg, was a co-author of “The Kellogg–Briand Pact or Pact of Paris” – officially the “General Treaty for Renunciation of War as an Instrument of National Policy.” It was an international agreement on peace in which signatory states promised not to use war to resolve “disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise among them.” The first signers of the document were the United States, France, and Germany. 

Needless to say, the treaty has not been kept. However, as I spoke this Armistice Day (the day’s name was unfortunately changed to Veterans’ Day), I wanted to make the point that there was a time when the United States actively sought peace in the world. When I rang the bell eleven times like was done at the end of World War I, signifying the end of fighting, my prayer was that we would remember what seeking peace was like and that we would one day return to that endeavor.  

May Peace prevail on Earth.

—Theodore John is president of Chapter 97, the Kansas City area chapter of Veterans for Peace. The photos below, by Jim Hannah, include a Vets for Peace sign as well as signs or memorabilia others brought, in tribute to soldiers and the war mission.