World War I
He accepted an appointment during World War I as Special Deputy Police Commissioner in New York City, greeting distinguished guests from around the world and helping organize the victory parade for General John J. Pershing and the returning doughboys. He purchased more World War I bonds than anyone else in the United States, and generously allowed the use of his residences for the war effort, "virtually putting his enormous wealth at the disposal of the United States." After the war Wanamaker acted as something of an official greeter for the City of New York, often lending his Landaulette Rolls-Royce for ticker-tape parades.
After the war, he financed the rebuilding of a school in Sarcus, France. A town fountain was dedicated in his memory.
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Famous quotes containing the words war i, world and/or war:
“In peacetime, they had all been normal decent, cowards, frightened of their wives, trembling before their bosses, terrified at the passing of the years, but war had made them gallant. They had been greedy men. Now they were self-sacrificing. They had been selfish. Now they were generous. War isn’t hell at all. It’s man at his best, the highest morality he is capable of.”
—Paddy Chayefsky (1923–1981)
“At most, the greatest persons are but great wens, and excrescences; men of wit and delightfull conversation, but as moales for ornament, except they be so incorporated into the body of the world that they contribute something to the sustentation of the whole.”
—John Donne (c. 1572–1631)
“Not marble nor the gilded monuments
Of princes shall outlive this powerful rime;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmeared with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war’s quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)