NJ WWI Centennial Commemoration, April 6, 2017
These remarks were delivered at the April 6, 2017 New Jersey World War I Centennial Commemoration at the Trenton War Memorial by New Jersey Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno.
"Thank you Brigadier General Michael Cunniff for the introduction. I’m proud to be here today to present this centennial spotlight on New Jersey and the Great War. And I’m proud as Secretary of State to be with you here at the War Memorial which originally opened in 1932 as “a great community center" dedicated to the memory of the soldiers and sailors from Mercer County who died fighting in World War I. The War Memorial is operated by our own Department of State, and I would like to thank Bill Nutter and his staff for all their great work here.
I would also like to extend thanks to Sara Cureton, our State’s Historical Commission Executive Director, for emceeing this event, as well as for all her work, and her staff’s work, to help New Jersey celebrate this important centennial anniversary. I would also like to thank Joe Klett and the State Archives staff who prepared the great photos that you will see later lining the screening room. And I would like to thank Terry Dearden and the staff at DMAVA, as well as all our National Guardsmen and women that are always there for us, from helping set up today’s event, to answering the call to serve on the front lines both here in New Jersey and across the world.
New Jersey played an important role in the history of the “war to end all wars.” From the three million troops who passed through the port in Hoboken on their way to the Front; to the 100th anniversary of Fort Dix, one of 16 national Army training camps built in 1917 to train World War I soldiers; to the notorious act of sabotage at the Black Tom Depot in Jersey City --- a terrible explosion that scarred the Statue of Liberty forever; to the new breed of warrior, the aviator, who engaged in single combat high above the conflict on the ground.
And as a Blue Star Mom, with a son flying F-16’s for the United States Air Force, I am fascinated by this history. And the history of New Jersey’s role in the war, of our soldiers and sailors. And our contributions to the Allied victory can be experienced at more than 160 sites across our State. And in this centennial year, I encourage you all to visit those sites. I encourage you all to take part in the centennial events happening across New Jersey this year.
And today on the 100th anniversary of the United States’ entry into the Great War, it is fitting for us to recall and salute those from every service and station from New Jersey 
who contributed to the Allied victory. From the importance of New Jersey’s business and industry to the Allied cause, such as J&J - which provided the bulk of surgical necessities to the battlefields across Europe; to all our female nurses who cared for the maimed and wounded with these supplies; to the eight New Jerseyans -- from Princeton, to Newark, to Summit --- who were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor; to Trenton native Needham Roberts, one of the first Americans to receive the French Croix de Guerre for heroism in battle, and who we will all learn more about during the screening which follows this ceremony.
And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the President who guided us through the Great War. In fact, the only New Jersey governor to also serve as President, Woodrow Wilson. Just four days before the U.S. entered the Great War, President Wilson went before a joint session of Congress to seek a Declaration of War against Germany. The words he uttered that day are as important now as they were then. Wilson noted, 'we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts, for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples, as shall bring peace and safety to all nations, and make the world itself at last free.'
So today let us honor all those who have rendered the highest service any New Jerseyan can offer. Those who have fought for our freedom and our security. Today we join as one State, and one people, to appreciate a debt we can never fully repay. A debt we are reminded of not only today, but especially every November 11th Veteran’s Day. Because on the 11th hour, of the 11th day, of the 11th month of 1918, an armistice was reached, and with it an eerie silence crept across the charred battlefields of Europe, ending 4 years of unfathomable destruction.
As I think of the Allied victory, and the price of that victory, I am reminded of poem by a Canadian doctor named John McCrae. Sitting in the back of an ambulance, McCrae put down into words the heavy sacrifice he had witnessed, arguably some of the most well-known words from the war:
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the dead, short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
To the over 70,000 New Jerseyans who enlisted and served in the war to end all wars, and to all those that gave their last full measure of devotion to their County and the Allied cause, we can say here today with certainty, that we caught the torch, we kept the faith, and if I may note the inscription on the medals awarded to thousands of those who served in World War I, a grateful nation remembers.
Thank you very much.
