World War I: Alliances, Key Events, and Aftermath

Triple Entente

A mutual defense agreement linking the French Third Republic, the Russian Empire, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

Triple Alliance (Central Powers)

A military alliance formed initially by Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy (though Italy later left and joined the Entente).

Sarajevo

The capital city of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in June 1914. This event was the immediate trigger for the outbreak of World War I.

U-Boat

An abbreviation for the German word Unterseeboot, meaning "undersea boat" or submarine. A highly effective German naval weapon, particularly in the use of unrestricted submarine warfare which drew the United States closer to war.

Sussex Pledge

A promise made by Germany in 1916 to the United States to stop sinking non-military ships without warning. A temporary cessation of unrestricted submarine warfare, which delayed the U.S. entry into the war until Germany resumed it a year later.

Jeannette Rankin (MT)

A Republican from Montana and the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress in 1916. She was a staunch pacifist and the only member of Congress to vote against U.S. entry into both World War I and World War II.

"War to End All Wars"

A popular phrase and slogan used to describe World War I, expressing the hope that its scale and horror would deter all future conflicts.

Liberty Bonds

War bonds sold by the U.S. government to its citizens to raise money to finance the country's participation in World War I. A crucial financial tool for the war effort and were promoted via extensive propaganda campaigns to instill patriotic support.

War Industries Board

A U.S. government agency established in July 1917 to coordinate the purchase of war supplies and encourage efficiency in wartime production, led by Bernard Baruch. Exercised centralized control over the U.S. economy, setting priorities, prices, and production methods during the war.

War Labor Board

An agency created in 1918 to mediate labor disputes and prevent strikes that might disrupt wartime production. Helped to secure essential labor cooperation during the war by supporting workers' rights, including the eight-hour day and the right to unionize.

Great Flu Pandemic of 1918

An unusually deadly strain of influenza that spread globally from 1918 to 1920, killing an estimated 50 million people worldwide, killing more people than the war itself.

Great Migration

The large-scale movement of millions of African Americans from the rural Southern United States to the industrial cities of the North and West between 1916 and 1970, largely driven by the search for economic opportunity and escape from racial segregation.

George Creel

An investigative journalist who served as the head of the U.S. Committee on Public Information (CPI) during World War I, directed the government's massive propaganda effort to gain public support for the war, portraying Germans as evil and the war as necessary.

War Revenue Act (1917)

A U.S. federal law that significantly raised income tax rates and established a new excess profits tax to fund the war effort.

Espionage Act (1917)

A U.S. federal law passed shortly after the U.S. entered World War I that made it a crime to interfere with the war effort or to promote the success of the nation's enemies, restricting freedom of speech and the press, becoming a key tool for suppressing dissent, especially against anti-war socialists and radicals.

Marcus Garvey

A Jamaican political activist who advocated for Black Nationalism and Pan-Africanism, founding the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) and a powerful voice for Black self-reliance and the "Back to Africa" movement

"Big Four"

The four dominant Allied leaders who negotiated the Treaty of Versailles: Woodrow Wilson (US), David Lloyd George (UK), Georges Clemenceau (France), and Vittorio Orlando (Italy)

Chicago Race Riots

A major racial conflict in Chicago in July 1919, sparked by a white man stoning a Black teenager who drifted into a "white" area of Lake Michigan, one of the most violent manifestations of the racial tensions exacerbated by the Great Migration

Universal Negro Improvement Association [UNIA]

A Black nationalist fraternal organization founded by Marcus Garvey aimed at uniting all people of African descent and establishing independent African states.

Red Scare

The period of intense anti-communism and fear of radical political dissent in the United States, particularly after the 1917 Russian Revolution and the wave of post-war strikes.

Palmer Raids

A series of mass arrests and deportations of suspected radicals and anarchists conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice under Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer in 1919 and 1920, a direct result of the First Red Scare

Archduke Franz Ferdinand

The heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, whose assassination in Sarajevo in June 1914 by a Serbian nationalist triggered the chain of events leading to World War I.

RMS Lusitania

A British ocean liner sunk by a German U-boat off the coast of Ireland in May 1915, killing 1,198 people, including 128 Americans, provoking widespread anti-German sentiment in the U.S.

Zimmermann Telegram

A secret diplomatic communication from Germany to Mexico in January 1917, proposing a military alliance against the United States, a key immediate factor in convincing the U.S. to enter World War I.

Selective Service Act (1917)

U.S. federal law passed to authorize the federal government to raise a national army through a compulsory draft, ultimately registering 24 million men.

Doughboys

The informal nickname given to American infantrymen serving in the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) during World War I.

Bernard Baruch

A successful financier who served as the chairman of the War Industries Board (WIB) during World War I, directed the U.S. economy's transition to war production and a wartime economy.

Billy Sunday

A highly influential and controversial American evangelist and former professional baseball player, who supported the war effort and Prohibition.

Ludlow Massacre

A violent attack by the Colorado National Guard and private guards of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company on striking coal miners and their families in Ludlow, Colorado, in April 1914.

Committee on Public Information

A U.S. government agency created to influence U.S. public opinion regarding American participation in World War I, America's first large-scale government propaganda agency to generate patriotism and support for the war.

Emma Goldman

A prominent anti-war critic and women's rights supporter during WWI who was arrested under the Espionage Act and later deported by the U.S. government during the Red Scare.

Sedition Act (1918)

An amendment to the Espionage Act that made it a federal crime to utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the U.S. government or war effort.

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)

A nonpartisan, non-profit organization founded in 1920 to "defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties" guaranteed to every person in the U.S. Constitution.

Abrams v. U. S. (1919)

A U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld the conviction of Russian immigrants who distributed leaflets criticizing the U.S. military intervention in Russia.

League of Nations

An intergovernmental organization founded after the Paris Peace Conference in 1920 to provide a forum for resolving international disputes and preventing future wars, but it ultimately failed due to a lack of enforcement power and the U.S. Senate's refusal to ratify the Treaty of Versailles.

Boston Police Strike (1919)

A strike by police officers in Boston for better wages and working conditions that led to the city experiencing several days of lawlessness.

Schenck v. U. S. (1919)

A U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the conviction of a socialist who distributed circulars opposing the military draft under the Espionage Act.

Fourteen Points

A statement of principles for world peace used for peace negotiations after World War I, delivered by President Woodrow Wilson in January 1918, which were the basis for the Armistice and the subsequent Treaty of Versailles

Sacco and Vanzetti Trial

A highly controversial trial of two Italian-born anarchists, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, who were convicted of robbery and murder in Massachusetts in 1921, which became a symbol of prejudice against immigrants and radical political beliefs during the Red Scare.

A. Mitchell Palmer

The U.S. Attorney General from 1919 to 1921 who became the central figure of the First Red Scare who order the Palmer Raids.

"Red Summer"

The period from the late winter through early autumn of 1919 during which bloody racial riots and massacres occurred in more than three dozen cities and counties across the United States, a peak of post-war racial violence.