A Lesson in History

I am a bit of a nerd. This is not a problem for me, nor is it something that should surprise anyone. And being a bit of a nerd, I enjoy history. I wouldn't really consider myself a history buff, but I do find history to be fascinating.

Last week my aunt and uncle were in town for a wedding, and we went to the Liberty Memorial and World War I Museum, which I had not been to. It was amazing! I (of course) took a ton of photos. The museum was laid out really well, and presented the information in a fantastic way. If you like history and have the chance, I highly recommend a visit - although it isn't a place that would be good for young kids.

These are a few shots from the museum - we also went to the top of the Liberty Memorial, but those deserve a post all their own, so I will share those next week.

And because I think that facts and numbers are fascination (I told you I was a nerd) here are the facts from the wall in the above shot:

1
Out of three French men between the ages of 18 and 30 died by 1917

33
Number of German cities where food riots broke out in 1916 to protest rationing

466
Length, in miles, of Western Front across Europe, October 1914

600
Parisian taxicabs that transported over 6,000 Army reservists 18 miles to the Ourcq River in the First Battle of the Mame, September 7 and 8, 1914

654
New German entered gun and ammunition production by November 1918

2,000
German periodicals ceased publicatin by February 13, 1916, because of the shortage of paper

2,250
Allied prisoners of war forced to work in the Ruhr, Germany coal mines, March 1917

6,261
British men who resisted the Military Services Acts and were arrested during the war

11,000
Errsaltz (substitute) products sold in German stores during the war, due to the blockade and war shortages

15,000
Bombs a week produced by one British explosives factory in March 1916 by 175 women workers

35,000
Miles of trenches crisscrossed by the Western Front by 1917

40,000
Applications received for a Red Cross first aid course in Berlin in late fall 1914, far surpassing the requested 3,000

55,397
German prisoners of war held in Great Britain in March 1917

116,233
French daily production of 75mm shells, January 1916

157,300
Gardens (schrebergarten) planted in Vienna, Austria, for supplimental food in 1918, up from 34,000 a year earlier.

200,000
Pounds in sterling subscribed in Canada to buy machine guns on August 2, 1915

600,000
Armenian men, women, and children died during Turkish removals

1,163,500
Tons of new ships built in Great Britain in 1917, up from 542,000 tons in 1916

1,392,2000
Women workers in the German War labor force in 1917, up 76% since late 1914

2,000,000
Russian workers employed in war industries in 1916

2,970,000
British women in industrial employment, July 1918

3,500,000
Estimated number of prisoners of war held by both the Allies and the Central Powers by 1917

5,000,000
Estimated number of civilians who perished as a direct result of the war

65,000,000
Artillery shells produced in Canada for the British Empire during the war

96,000,000
Daily cost (in 1918 dollars) of waging war by European Nations by 1918

100,000,000
Sandbags produced and exported from Great Britain to the Allies in 1916

124,975,200
In pound sterling, British War Savings Certificates sold from January through October 1917

4,000,000,000
Russian war debt (in 1917 dollars) by the time Russia withdrew from the war in 1917