Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on December 27, 1930.
FIRST OF ANNUAL TRIBUTES TO “THE GREAT KNOWN SOLDIER OF WORLD WAR,” GIVEN SUNDAY
Valparaiso and Porter county, Sunday, will pay tribute to the memory of the “great known soldier of the World War”... Woodrow Wilson.
It was Georges Clemenceau, the Tiger of France, and the outstanding rival of the American president in the negotiations that resulted in the negotiations that resulted in the formation of the League of Nations and the drafting of the Versailles peace treaty, who paid Wilson the above tribute. It was the occasion of the last visit of Clemenceau to the United States. Wilson, a hopeless invalid, was living in retirement, in his home on ‘S’ street, in Washington.
Clemenceau had not seen the former president since the stirring days of the peacemaking in Paris when Wilson worked twelve and fifteen hours a day in the interest of what he termed “a just peace.”
To find his former colleague a physical wreck was a great shock for the famous Frenchman. He was in tears as he left the bedroom of the former president.
“I have just left the bedside of the great known soldier of the war,” he stated. It was one of the most beautiful tributes ever paid Woodrow Wilson.
So, tomorrow afternoon, at Varsity Theatre at 2:30 o’clock, the first program of what is proposed as an annual tribute on his birthday anniversary, over the nation, will be held in Valparaiso. Everyone is invited. Attorneys John N. Underwood of Gary, Mark Storen of Michigan City and others, will deliver brief addresses.
