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Valley played critical role in WWI
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YOUNGSTOWN
Valley Involvement in WWI
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As the nation celebrates the Veterans Day centennial, many are unaware the Mahoning Valley played an important – and largely unknown – medical role in the country’s involvement in World War I before the nation officially declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917.
Before entering the war, the U.S. was an important ally to Great Britain and the other Allied powers.
One of the initiatives of that alliance was Youngstown Base Hospital No. 31, the formation of which was spearheaded by Dr. Colin R. Clark, who had been practicing in Youngstown for 20 years, and the Mahoning County Red Cross, said Cassie Nespor, curator of Youngstown State University’s William F. Maag Library.
Nespor, who graduated from Sharon High School, Sharon, Pa., and received a bachelor’s degree in history from Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pa., and a master’s degree in library science from the University of Pittsburgh, has researched the Base Hospital No. 31 experience.
Within a few months in 1917, Dr. Clark and the Red Cross raised $50,000 for supplies to create a 500-bed facility in Contrexeville, France, in the Vosage Mountains, and had recruited and selected volunteers – 26 doctors, 63 nurses and 150 enlisted men – to perform other tasks in the new hospital.
After cleaning up eight buildings they were given to occupy, Youngstown Base Hospital No. 31 went to work caring for patients.
Beginning in March 1918, the medical unit treated 3,413 U.S. and Allied military personnel, most suffering from gas poisoning and lower respiratory tract infection. The surgical unit treated 4,419 patients, Nespor said.
“What impresses me about the Youngstown Base Hospital No. 31 project is that this scrappy little town, with people from Warren and Niles, and Struthers and Sharon and other nearby communities, sent a hospital unit to Europe when most came from much larger cities,” Nespor said.
So successful was the initiative, it was eventually supplemented by an 80-person contingent from Syracuse, N.Y., which allowed the hospital to expand to 1,200 beds.
The staffing for Youngstown Base Hospital No. 31 did not leave for home until nearly two months after the war ended Nov. 11, 1918.
Among events scheduled for today specifically highlighting the Veterans Day centennial, the 100-year anniversary of the cease-fire and Armistice that ended World War I, are a ceremony hosted by the United Veterans Council of Youngstown from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Mahoning County Courthouse, 120 Market St., Youngstown; and a musical tribute presented by the Mahoning Valley Historical Society at 2 p.m. at the Tyler History Center, 325 W. Federal St., Youngstown.
The Joseph N. Rubin Orchestra of Canton will perform “Over There: The Music of World War I” at 2 p.m. at Tyler History Center in commemoration of the centennial. The program includes a vocalist and visual elements, said Tracy Manning, curator of education at the Tyler.
Tickets for the Tyler presentation are $20 for reserved seating, $15 for general admission, $10 for MVHS members and $5 for veterans and active military.