Wyoming Veterans Museum: World War One Display

Display dedicated to George Ostron, who was an accomplished armature illustrator and who won a contest to design what became the unit insignia.  A post on this topic is coming up on Lex Anteinternet.

I have a very lengthy photo post on the Wyoming Veterans Museum on this site already.  Normally, when adding to an existing topic, I do just that, but in this case I'm posting a new thread as, like most museums, the Wyoming Veterans Museum updates its displays and it would neither do justice to their new display nor to the prior thread to add to it.  Their new display concerns World War One and is focused on Wyomingites who served in the Great War.  They've done a very nice job with it and its a real credit to the museum.

 

 

 

 Ostrom illstration of a New Mexican town.  He had served with the National Guard in the Punitive Expedition.

 

 

 Very nice example of National Guard collar insignia from this period in the upper left, and a subdued chevron on the right.  Subdued chevrons would be a feature of the uniform all the way into the early Vietnam War but rank structure for enlisted men constantly changed.  This insignia hearkens back to the 19th Century with its bugler specialty device and would pass into history before World War Two.

Early in World War One the push for recruitment was with the Navy over the Army and in the opening weeks of the war it was assumed that the Navy would be taking the primary role in the fight with the Army doing relatively little.  Many Wyomingites, in the first rush towards the flag, joined the Navy accordingly.

Fred Kislter's name is associated with Kistler Tent & Awning, an early Casper business that's still in operation today.

French carbine and Adrien helmet, as used by some US African American soldiers assigned to French command.

Trench knives.

Telephone switchboard.  World War One came at the beginning of a revolution in communications that would soon change that area completely.

A display dedicated to nurses in the Great War.

While its very much contrary to what is commonly believed, women played a role in World War One's home front work place that was as great as that which they'd later play in World War Two.  It's just largely forgotten.

German equipment, including a machine gun, brought back to the US as souveniers.

The legendarily bad Chauchat automatic rifle that was used by the US, as supplied by the French, for a light machine gun during World War One.

Somewhat bizarre veterans' organization outfit.

The Red Cross played a very large role in World War One support.

Lex Anteinternet: The Fallen of World War Two.

Lex Anteinternet: The Fallen of World War Two.

The Black 14, University of Wyoming, Laramie Wyoming

This is a monument to The Black 14 in the University of Wyoming's Student Union.

The Black 14 were fourteen University of Wyoming football players who, in 1969, wanted to wear black armbands during the University of Wyoming v. Brigham Young football game. The action was intended to protest the policy of the Mormon church in excluding blacks from leadership roles in their church.  Coach Eaton, the UW football coach at the time, dismissed all fourteen players prior to the game, ending their football careers at UW and, at least in some cases, simply ending them entirely.

 

The event was controversial at the time, and to a lesser degree, has remained so.  Generally, in most of Wyoming, Coach Eaton was supported, rather than the players, which doesn't mean that the players did not have support.  As time has gone on, however, views have changed and generally the players are regarded as heroes for their stand.  Views on Eaton are qualified, with some feeling he was in the wrong, and others feeling that he was between a rock and a hard place and acted as best as he could, even if that was not for the best.

It is indeed possible even now to see both sides of the dramatic event.  The players wanted to wear black armbands in protest of the Mormon's policy of not allowing blacks to be admitted to the Mormon priesthood and therefore also excluding them from positions of leadership in the Mormon church.  This policy was well know in much of Wyoming as the Mormon theology behind it, which held that blacks were descendant of an unnatural union on the part of Noah's son Cain, resulted in black human beings.  This was unlikely to be widely known, however, amongst blacks at the University of Wyoming, most of whom (but not all of which) came from outside of the state.  A week or so prior to the UW v. BYU game, however, Willie Black, a black doctoral candidate at UW who was not on the football team, learned of the policy.  Black was head of the Black Students Alliance and called for a protest.  The plan to wear armbands then developed.

The protest, therefore, came in the context of a civil rights vs. religious concepts background, a tough matter in any context.  To make worse, it also came during the late 60s which was a time of protest, and there had been one against the Vietnam War just days prior to the scheduled game. Following that, Eaton reminded his players of UW's policy against student athletes participating in any demonstration, a policy which raises its own civil liberties concern. The players went ahead with tehir plans and Eaton removed all of them from the team.

Looked at now, it remains easy to see why Eaton felt that he had to act, while also feeling that he acted much too harshly.  Not everyone agrees with this view by any means, however.  Many, but a declining number, still feel Eaton was right.  A much larger number feel he was definitely wrong.  Few hold a nuanced view like I've expressed.  Even those who felt that Eaton was right often admire the protesting players, however.

Anyway its looked at, the Black 14 are now a definite part of Wyoming's legacy as The Equality State, even if most of them were not from here (at least one, and maybe more, were).  This year at Wyoming History Day, a statewide high school history presentation competition, which had the theme of "taking a stand", they were the subject of one static display and two video presentations.  They may be more well remembered now than at any time since the late 1970s, and this memorial in the student union certainly contributes to that.

Cattlemen Monument, Sublette County Wyoming.

 

The Lander Cut Off, Oregon Trail. Sublette County Wyoming

Monument for the Lander Cut Off of the Oregon Trail, an early road project on the part of the Federal Government.  This is located just outside of Marbleton, Wyoming.

South Pass, Wyoming

Lex Anteinternet: Award Authorization Date for the Purple Heart

Lex Anteinternet: Award Authorization Date for the Purple Heart: April 15, 1917 is the first date for which a serviceman can be awarded the Purple Heart for "Being wounded or killed in any action ...

Lex Anteinternet: Evidence that maybe somebody at your local paper i...

Lex Anteinternet: Evidence that maybe somebody at your local paper i...: Hmmm. . . . if that photo is right Sgt. Bellamy was in the Wehrmacht during World War Two. . . .

March 29 Designated National Vietnam Veterans Day

By an act of Congress signed into law on this day by President Trump, March 29 will hence forth be National Vietnam Veterans Day.

Casper/Natrona County Fallen Firefighter Memorial. Casper Wyoming.

This is Casper Fire Station Number 1.  The fire station was built in the early 1970s as part of an urban renewal project when Federal and City funding renovated the former red light district of the Sand Bar in Casper.  The station replaced one two blocks to the south, which was Casper's original Fire Station Number 1.

When it was built, the east wall of the new fire stataion was deciated as a memorial to Casper and Natrona County's fallen firefighters.