Who Are The Celebrities Who Were Veterans Of The Great War

[patches]

Discovered Two Pro Ball Players who made the Supreme Sacrifice in the World War.

 

One Edward L. Grant , or Eddie Grant, or Harvard Eddie, Philadelphia, Cincinnati and New York,

 

Captain, Company Commander Co H 307th Infantry 77th Division KIA Oct 5 1918, The Argonne. Grant rests still in France, Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial Plot A, Row 02, Grave 24

 

 

 

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ultimate-sacrifice-180728112/

 

[patches]

The next, Robert G. Troy, or Bun Troy, was gonna play for Philadelphia, but that didn't go through, did played for a spell with Detroit, then back in the minors, Troy was German born incidentally, and DOW, Sergeant, Company G 319th Infantry 80th Division,The Argonne Oct 1918, he's buried in Pennsylvania, where his family immigrated to.

 

(Can't find service photo).

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bun_Troy

[patches]

Robert Warwick

 

Robert Warwick was in an incredible amount of stuff from 1914 to 1960, Silent movies of course to start with,then Takies, a whold load of stuff we see him in, like The Adventures of Robin Hood with Erroll Flynn, Basel Rathbone et al, I Married a Witch 1942 (The basis of the 60s TV show Bewitched)

 

He's leaves acting in the WW and joins the Army when he was 39 years of age and serves in France as a Infantry officer and apperarly see's action as a Company Commander. (one source says 4th Div???), he also served later as a Liaison Officer with the French Army, (one source says he was discharged as a Major 1919), just like so many individuals we find, unit info and service photos are not available.

 

Warwick is familiar to most of us as Air Vice Marshal Alexander MacKaye, in the spooky Twilight Zone Episode, The Last Flight

 

Dialog from a play, Hamlet to Horatio: There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Dialog from a play written long before men took to the sky: There are more things in heaven and earth and in the sky than perhaps can be dreamt of. And somewhere in between heaven, the sky, and the earth, lies The Twilight Zone.

 

 

[patches]

George Halas

 

 

 

Watching Brian's Song on DVD I got a few months back on Amazon, so as I do, I WIKIed it to look at the actors and stuff. Seen Halas, a actual native of Chicago and the Chicago Bears legendary coach was a officer in the Navy, he apparently never had sea duty, seems to have played for Navy teams in his spare duty time. Also wasn't aware that he also played Pro Baseball for a brief period, the New York Yankees Halas joined the Navy again in WWII with the rank of Lt Cmdr.

 

You can read all about it here.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Halas#Early_life_and_sports_career

 

Here's a IMAGE of him in WWII (We don't like to post these type IMAGES as they are usually for for sale, so we just post the link, you can buy it if you want )

 

https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/american-football-pioneer-george-halas-appears-in-uniform-news-photo/51539497

[patches]

Leslie Howard served briefly as an officer, there doubts he went overseas, got a medical discharge or something.

[jmace57]

Andrew B. Kelly - he was "the fastest man alive" before ww1 and was expected to be the first person to break the 4 minute mile. Joined the 7th New York Regiment from Holy Cross College, and served through the end of the war. Competed in the Inter-Allied Games inn Paris in 1919.

[patches]

On 2/7/2016 at 7:49 PM, patches said:

Alfred Eisenstaedt

 

Eisenstaedt was in the German Army in an Artillery Regiment on the Western From from 1916 on, he was badly wounded in December 1917, one source says he was the only survivor of his Battalion.

 

 

Eisenstaedt who was Jewish left Germany and came to the U.S. he was the one who took that Iconic photo in Times Square NY NY of the sailor with the nurse on VJ Day. I think he also might of been in the U.S. Navy for a bit, don't remember now.

 

Found that photo of Alfred Eisenstaedt, this is taken post war in Japan in 1946 up north on Hokkaido posing with Ainu people, the very strange thing about this is his navy service isn't mentioned, when you google it, all you get hits for is his times square photo of the sailor and the nurse When he took that photo in times square on V-J Day he must of been on leave right, wouldn't think he joined the navy after the war ended right.

 

http://images.google.com/hosted/life/14b807ab9828ee6e.html

[patches]

Rewatching the 1947 film Mr Blanding's Builds His Dream House, Cary Grant Myna Loy et al,Reginald Denny is it in and looked him up on his Wiki, he was in the Great War as observer/gunner in the RFC/RAF.

 

Here he is posing in the new Blue Uniform of the newly titled Royal Air Force in late-sh 1918, Denny curiously isn't wearing his wings though.

 

 

[ScottG]

John Dos Passos, novelist and artist.

 

"

In July 1917, with World War I raging in Europe, Dos Passos volunteered for the S.S.U. 60 of the Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps, along with friends Cummings and Robert Hillyer. Later, he also worked as a volunteer ambulance driver with the American Red Cross in north-central Italy.

By the late summer of 1918, Dos Passos had completed a draft of his first novel. At the same time, he had to report for duty with the U.S. Army Medical Corps at Camp Crane in Pennsylvania. On Armistice Day, he was stationed in Paris, where the U.S. Army Overseas Education Commission allowed him to study anthropology at the Sorbonne. Three Soldiers, his novel drawn from those experiences, features a character who has virtually the same military career as the author and stays in Paris after the war."

 

[ScottG]

Amelia Earhart, Voluntary Aid Detachment in Canada.

 

"During Christmas vacation in 1917, Earhart visited her sister in Toronto. World War I had been raging and Earhart saw the returning wounded soldiers. After receiving training as a nurse's aide from the Red Cross, she began work with the Voluntary Aid Detachment at Spadina Military Hospital. Her duties included preparing food in the kitchen for patients with special diets and handing out prescribed medication in the hospital's dispensary."

 

[ScottG]

Conn Smythe Hockey legend,

 

[patches]

11 hours ago, ScottG said:

Conn Smythe Hockey legend,

 

A great addition Scott

 

More on him, he seen a bit of action in France as we as an Artilleryman, was awarded a Military Cross and later as a Aviator, he was shot too, and captured eventually. And he joined up again in WWII, where he was badly wounded in Normandy, one source says his location he was at an Ammo Dump was bombed by air by the Germans, a rare occurrence at that stage of the war.

 

/https://en.rcamuseum.com/maj-c-smythe-oc-mc-1895-1980/

 

 

Here's Smythe in the Great War, the other photos  of him are from WWII.

 

 

[patches]

Raymond Massey hasn't been mentioned in detail.

 

Here's a good site on him

 

http://www.canadiangreatwarproject.com/searches/soldierDetail.asp?ID=66693

 

And a photo here were he dons the U.S. Army Officer Greens as a USO guy in Germany in July 1944, Massey served again in the Canadian Army in the next war, but doesn't serve that long and is discarded and returns to America. On his IKE Jacket we see ribbons, could they be his Great War Ribbons????

 

https://www.ww2online.org/image/actor-raymond-massey-soldier-augsburg-germany-18-july-1945

[Salvage Sailor]

On 12/22/2016 at 1:27 PM, Salvage Sailor said:

American sculptor Lawrence Tenney Stevens, (1896-1972) Volunteered for WWI service but I've never figured out where he served. He was quite a patriotic yet independent, private individual despite his international awards and fame in the 1920's and 30's. Many of his largest bronze sculptures in public parks and spaces he had melted down for the war effort and then again volunteered for the secret mission Project 19 sent to support the British and Commonwealth forces in North Africa, 1941. This is a bronze commemorative plaque made by Stevens for his fellow members of the Project 19 mission to Eritrea. It is made by Medallic Art co., a foundry which Stevens had knowledge of being a bronze sculptor and client.

 

 

 

 

 

Pvt. Lawrence T. Stevens, 469698. 11th Company, Coast Artillery Corps, A.E.F., shipped over on 7/15/1918 as a Chauffeur in the training detachment.