7 April 1918: Light the Torch of Liberty

On this day in 1918, the following full-page ad appeared on page 8 of the Athens Banner:

 

 (click on image to enlarge)

The third "Liberty Loan" offered $3 billion in bonds at 4.5% interest, and was issued on April 5, 1918. Created to fund the First World War, Secretary of the Treasury W. G. McAdoo had a wide-ranging publicity program. He embarked on an extensive speaking tour, and commissioned  artists such as James Montgomery Flagg, H. C. Christy, Charles Dana Gibson for an aggressively patriotic poster campaign. Secretary McAdoo also hired movie stars such as Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and America's Sweetheart, Mary Pickford to tour the country encouraging Americans to purchase bonds.

Anyone and everyone, including troops of Boy and Girl Scouts, could and were encouraged to sell Liberty Bonds. Ads encouraging the purchasing of bonds were placed by local financial businesses, but also Athens Railway & Electric Company, Martin Brothers Shoe Store, Palmer & Sons drug stores, and the Davison-Nicholson department store. Athens also had a local "Libery Bond Committee," which would promote Liberty Bonds as a patriotic duty before showings of movies or other performances, and sent letters to pastors to read to their congregations, encouraging them to buy bonds to "do your part to stamp out Prussian autocracy."

Learn More:

• Athens Banner, Jan. 1918 - Nov. 1918 on Microfilm in the Heritage collection.
• The United States in the First World War: An Encyclopedia by Anne Cipriano Venzon in the Reference collection.
• The Yanks Are Coming: The United States in the First World War by Albert Marrin in the general collection.
• Over Here: The First World War and American Society by David M. Kennedy in the general collection.
• America Enters the World: A People's History of the Progressive Era and World War I by Page Smith in the general collection.
• Victory, 1918 by Alan Warwick Palmer in the general collection.
• Wake Up, America! World War I and the American Poster by Walton H. Rawls via PINES.
• Miller's Collecting Prints & Posters by Janet Gleeson in the general collection.
  
• The Poster in History by Max Gallo in the general collection.
• Poets of World War I by Harold Bloom in the general collection.
• The Great War: A Guide to the Service Records of All the World's Fighting Men and Volunteers by Christine K. Schaefer in the Heritage collection.
• American Posters of World War I online exhibit on the Georgetown University Library website.
• Images of Liberty Bonds from a collector's website.
• Original Liberty Bond posters available for sale.