Tv and sunday on American History tv on cspan3. He discussed how song writers contributed to the war effort by writing patriotic music. This is an hour and 15 minutes. Good evening to all of you. Im bob enholm, the executive director of the Woodrow Wilson house. Were a private charity supported by donations of supporters, including many of you. For that i thank you. Thanks for being here this evening. This home is the home to which president and mrs. Wilson moved the very day they left the white house, on march 4 in 1921. They both lived here the rest their lives. Wilson passed away three years later. Mrs. Wilson lived here until 1961. Then upon her death, left the home to the National Trust for historical preservation. It was opened as a Public Museum in 1963. We are now more than 50 years as an institution here in washington, d. C. Its good to see all of you here tonight. Our program is smile while you kiss me sad adieu, world war i songs. Let me set the stage and introduce or speake
Hes going over there to do his share when alexander takes him ragtime band to france hell capture everyone and take them one by one the ragtime tunes will put the germans in a trans theyll sing hip hip hooray theyll get so excited theyll come over the top two steps back to berlin with a hip and a hop hitler will know when alexander takes his ragtime band to france now, i came in here and rehearsed. So imagine how bad it would be if i hadnt rehearsed. That song obviously comes once weve gone into the war. Let me fill in the pieces broadly, and then as the songs come up, ill place them for you. We get that berlin song called lets all be americans now which comes soon after a group of songs that were in response to a specific incident. That is what really galvanizes american patriotism. What really galvanizes american support for the allies, you know what the event was . The sinking of the lusitania. In the months after the sinking, there are dozens of songs about the sinking of the lusit
Disillusioned pessimists. We have created a polarity here between militaryists and disillusioned pessimists. Most of us dont fit in with that. Were in between. Right . He says soldiers were not disenchanted by the war. The war never offered them an enchanting prospect. They were just fed up. He had not wanted war. But he engaged in it. He liked it less than he expected. But he proposed to see it through. If which god forbid similar circumstances arose in 1929, he would do it again. There are no Great Expectations of going into the trenches. No one naively look at the war and thought this is going to be a good time. When they got there, it was pretty terrible. Then he gives us this striking, striking statement of how this doesnt fit in with what hemingway was saying. He says the greater the haorror of battle, the nobler of the man who is not morally ruined by it. If i was a minister and i said that from a pulpit, you would be scared. Right . Natalie. I kind of have a little bit of a pro
Patriotic songs. This 1 hour 15minute event was hosted by the Woodrow Wilson house in washington, d. C. Good evening to all of you. Im bob enholm, the executive director of the Woodrow Wilson house. Were a private charity supported by the donations of supporters, including many of you. For that i thank you, and thanks for being here this evening. This home is the home to which president and mrs. Wilson moved the very day they left the white house, on march 4th, in 1921. They both lived here the rest of their lives. President wilson passed away about three years later. Mrs. Wilson, remarkably, lived here until 1961. And then upon her death, left the home to the National Trust for historic preservation. And so it was open to the Public Museum in 1963. So were now more than 50 years as an institution here in washington, d. C. Its good to see all of you here tonight. Our program is entitled smile while you kiss me sad ado, world war i songs. Let me set the stage here, and introduce our spe
Are a few mother songs, mothers proud that youre in uniform, sonny, that sort of thing, that unfortunately had not survived. The songs are the love songs of the war are largely about a couple, whether married or not, separated. So the emotions of warfare in song are in the love songs, and youll see this a little bit later, are about separation, parting, loneliness, longing, the hope of return. You find those in the love songs of world war i, and you find them in the love songs of world war ii. And those three wars, civil, i and ii, are really the wars where there is a large body of song because there was a sense of the nation engaged, that there was not certainly in the wars since world war ii. There arent a lot of songs about korea. And im not being snotty. It was a different kind of war. The people were not engaged by it. In vietnam, you had some songs, but theyre songs in which two groups are warring with one another. Give peace a chance, and whats the im an oaky from muskokee. Iraq