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Outagamie County (Wis.) State Centennial Committee / Land of the fox, saga of Outagamie County
([1949])
Dohr, Raymond P.
"To arms!", pp. 232-249
PDF (7.9 MB)
Page 242
THE LAND OF THE FOX country in various cantonments and in universities and colleges to be trained in special duties. Nearly 100 men of the county volun- teered for service in the Navy. Three Appleton sailors lost their lives at sea during the war. They were Leo Mc- Gahn, who died of disease, August Zule- ger, killed in action and Charles Filz who was lost when the collier, Cyclops, mysteri- ously disappeared. Lawrence College was selected as one of the training centers for the Student Army Training Corps during the war and on October 1, 1918, 403 men took the oath of service. The ceremonies that marked the occasion were in charge of General Charles K. Boardman who had served overseas with the 32nd Division. On Armistice Day, November 11, 1918, pandemonium reigned throughout the county. The joy of the people was ex- pressed by their tears and laughter, by the whistles of the mills and factories, by the honking horns of the automobiles and the ringing of church bells. Outagamie County was signally hon- ored in 1921 when Sergeant John E. Hantschel was chosen by President Warren G. Harding to represent the state of Wisconsin at the public burial of the 'Unknown Soldier" at Arlington Nation- al Cemetery, Washington, D.C., on Ar- mistice Day. Sergeant Hantschel had made an enviable record in the war and had been severely wounded in action in France on July 27, 1918. On March 18, 1919, the first meeting was held to organize a veterans' post in Appleton and on April 17 the final organ- ization became effective taking the name of Oney Johnston, who was the highest ranking man in the first group of Appleton men killed in France. This post became part of the American Legion and contrib- uted two Department Commanders to the state organization, L. Hugo Keller in 1924-1925 and Marshall C. Graff in 1930- 1931. Other Legion Posts were organized in Kaukauna, Post No. 41; Little Chute, No. 258, the Jacob Coppes Post; Seymour, No. 106, the Krause-Kraft Post; Kim- berly, No. 60, the William Verhagen Post; Black Creek, No. 332, the Arnold Duhm Post; Hortonville, Post No. 55; the Shiocton Post and in 1923 the Outa- gamie County Council of American Legion Posts was organized to direct and co- ordinate all the Legion activities of the county. The Veterans of Foreign Wars organized a post in the Town of Maine sometime in the early 1920's. This was the Wolf River Post No. 6769 and is the oldest post in the county. Another group was organized at the Armory in Appleton on February 20, 1932. It took the name of one of the soldiers killed in action over- seas in the Battle of Champagne in 1918, Harvey Pierre, by which name it is still known. In 1935 the Electric City Post, No. 3311, of Kaukauna was organized. Bear Creek organized the Edward J. Malliet Post No. 2663 and posts were also organized in Freedom and Seymour. After the Armistice was signed the Rainbow Division organized its own vet- erans organization while still in France and when the men returned home, a local post was organized for the county veterans in Appleton. The Military Order of the Purple Heart was also organized consisting of soldiers who had been wounded in action and a strong flourishing chapter exists by the name of Fox River Valley Chapter. The Disabled Veterans also organized a post in the county. All of the veterans' organizations be- came a powver and force for good in the county and it was through their combined efforts that the County Board established a Service Officer in the Court House in 1935 and named Edward E. Lutz as the Service Officer. This office has proved of incalculable benefit to the numerous serv- ice men of the county, not only assisting the veterans in filling out the numerous forms required by the Veterans Adminis- tration but in addition pressing to com- pletion the individual rights of the vet- 242
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