Existing comment:
1917:
When the United States declared war in April 1917, 185,000 National Guardsmen were called to federal service. States received federal funding to actively recruit new troops and bring Guard units up to wartime strength. In all, nearly half a million National Guardsmen served in the Great War in eighteen Army divisions and throughout the fledgling Army Air Service. The Guard provided nearly 40 percent of the United States divisional strength on European battlefields.
Initially, sixteen National Guard divisions were organized according to state and regional lines. Shortly after the U.S. entered the war, the 42nd "Rainbow" Division was created from units hailing from 26 states and the District of Columbia. The 27,000-man division was aptly named, as its members represented a cross-section of American communities that, as then Major Douglas MacArthur remarked, "... stretched over the country like a rainbow." Many governors and National Guard commanders sought a spot for their troops in this "all-American" division. |