A Forgotten Memory - Washington DC's World War I Memorial

Wanting for the attention of both Visitors and the Congress, the World War I memorial stands on the south side of the National Mall

Just off of Independence Avenue in Washington DC, nestled amidst a tall grove of holly trees, stands a small and unobtrusive marble structure. No signs mark its solemn grounds; and most tourists never see it standing in the shade and underbrush on their half mile trek from the expansive World War II memorial to the feet of Lincoln. The flagstones around its four foot marble base are cracked and broken with age and tall grass; and weeds now sprout from the crumbled mortar that once joined them into a modest platform.

Inscribed upon the monument are the 26,000 names of the men of the District of Columbia who gave their lives in "the Great War to Save Civilization." Today those names and the war they fought are all but forgotten - much as the woods and weeds have reclaimed much of this venerable monument.

The Washington DC World War One memorial is, in a very real sense, a causality of history. Constructed at the height of the Depression and dedicated in 1931, the memorial has now gone nearly thirty years without substantive attention. Long black water streaks have stained the marble columns and years of neglect have ground dirt and dust into the raised floor. Much like the memorial itself, the war it commemorates has faded from the minds of Americans. The few remaining veterans of the First World War are now well over 100 years old. Their sacrifices on the battlefields of France are all but forgotten and, like their memorial, glossed over in favor of more recent conflicts sharper and clearer in the American memory.

Despite its humble surroundings, the memorial was not always of such little renown. Designed by architect Frederick H. Brooke as a band stand, the memorial's dedication featured the President's Own United States Marine Band, directed by John Phillips Souza himself. It is, as the DC Preservation League says, "a gemstone in the crown of local Washington, D.C. memorial architecture and civic pride." Of all the structures on the Mall, the World War One memorial is the only one that commemorates the actions of DC residents specifically. It remains the only memorial within the District to mark The Great War and the last remnant of a portion of American history that is fast fading from our national memory.

As Congress appropriates millions for pet-projects like the now infamous "Bridge to Nowhere," the new car museum in Warren, Ohio, and other questionable applications of the tax payer's money from super-star architectural projects like Dallas' proposed suspension bridge to Vermont snowmobile trails, there must be left at least few dollars in the budget to remember the 26,000 souls who gave their lives for their country in a foreign land almost a century ago. Surely this "pro-war" Congress can find the time, money, and votes to remember the lives lost in the trenches of Verdun and the supreme sacrifice of a nation that lies beneath the fields of Flanders.

Surely they deserve at least that honor.

Sources

• DC Preservation League: Most Endangered Places
• NPR: Washington's World War I Memorial
• US New and World Report: A Bridge (Way) Too Far

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