Oct. 7, 1921: Twin Cities plan a half-day Armistice Day with a parade and a mass meeting
Labor, business, veterans and university groups formed the celebration committee.
CHAMPAIGN - On this date in 1921, the Twin City Review reported that plans for Champaign-Urbana's Armistice Day celebration were "rapidly taking shape."
The celebration committee held its first general meeting that week in the Chamber of Commerce rooms and elected James Brown of the Twin City Federation of Labor as permanent chairman, the labor weekly reported. Members came from the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion, the Champaign Chamber of Commerce, both city councils, Urbana churches and the University of Illinois homecoming committee.
The committee favored a half-day holiday rather than a full one, the paper said, noting that merchants would also close for Thanksgiving and that working people could ill afford to lose a full day's pay. It planned an Armistice parade in the afternoon, followed by a mass meeting on the limitation of armaments.
Source: Twin City Review (Champaign, Ill.), Oct. 7, 1921, page 1, via the Library of Congress, Chronicling America.