Editor’s Note: We are republishing excerpts from the 1917 Woodford Sun. The United States entered the First World War by declaring war on the German Empire on April 6, 1917. The Clippings will tell how Woodford County responded and was impacted by “The Great War.” We will return to 1891, where we have been since November, for a few weeks in July and August for the ratification debate and vote on the 1891 Kentucky Constitution. For historical purposes, we reprint the Clippings “warts and all,” and so the presence of derogatory and racist stereotypical words are reprinted.
The Woodford Sun
June 7, 1917
(Note – The Sun did not publish the week of May 31, 1917)
[Fourth Chautauqua] L.D. McGirr, representative of the Redpath Chautauqua, was in Versailles on Monday to making preliminary arrangements for the opening of the Chautauqua two weeks from today. The program this year is exceptionally fine. The first night lecture will be delivered by Lt. Donald McGibney on the subject of “At the Front in France.” Lt. Gibney served in the American Ambulance Service on the French front and he will take his hearers to the very center of the titanic struggle. Tickets are now on sale. The great Scottish baritone Knight MacGregor will perform. Montaville Wood, an engineer who has long been associated with Thomas Edison, will speak on the gyroscope in aviation.
[National Defense District Meeting] The meeting of the National Defense District was held at the Phoenix Hotel in Lexington last week. All counties in the District were present. Louis Marshall, cashier of the Woodford Bank & Trust Co., chair for Woodford County, and Rev. J.M. Maxon, president of Margaret College and member of the county committee, were called upon to make addresses. Mr. Marshall made a report on the crops of the county, which have been increased to meet the demands of war, and Liberty Loan bonds totaling $185,000 had been subscribed in Woodford. He noted few persons realized how close war had come to home. Rev. Maxson said the war was a war of defense, a home for home and fireside, a war for God, and that if we lose this war it means the devastation of home and the enthroning of the German god.
[People You Know] The graduating class of Shelby County visited friends in Versailles in a stolen truck before going on to Lexington.
[A Country Editor’s Thoughts by Atchison Bowmar] A splendid way to help in the farm labor problem will be for the Mayor and Police Committee of the City Council to order the strictest enforcement of the vagrancy laws to force every vagrant, white and black, to go to work or go to jail at hard labor. Those who do not work are in some manner living off the community, and this is no time to feed lazy mouths. Go to it, Mr. Mayor! Every week Woodford boys are voluntarily enlisting in the army and navy. The allotment of Liberty Bonds to Woodford will be over-subscribed. Woodford people are true and noble and Woodford people will do her part.