Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens, and the University of Akron will host a premiere screening of the documentary, “Lost Voices of the Great War: Summit County in the First World War,” Tuesday, Oct. 30, 7 p.m., in the auditorium of Akron-Summit County Public Library’s Main Library. The screening is open to the public free of charge.
Additionally, the story is based on Summit County residents’ experiences at home and overseas during the First World War. Now, the documentary uses dramatic reenactment footage, narration, interviews, period music and sound effects. From collections of 100-year-old letters, film, photographs, images and documents, the documentary fills the pieces together.
There are a number of significant people profiled:
- Mary Gladwin, who volunteered to serve with the International Red Cross, three years before the United States declared war in 1917.
- F.A. Seiberling, co-founder of The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, which produced blimps, tires and gas masks for the war, and his son, Fred, who enlisted with the Ohio National Guard before going overseas to serve with “Battery B” of the First Ohio Field Artillery.
- Several “Goodyearites,” including Lester S. Himmelberger, who served in the “Balloon Division.”
- The committee, awarded the French Croix de Guerre for bravery award to Charles C. Jackson. In fact he is also the most African American decorated officer from Ohio.
- Grace Goulder, who quit as the first female reporter with the Cleveland Plain Dealer to serve in France with YWCA.
Visit http://bit.ly/LostVoices-promo to watch a promo video of this documentary.
This film is produced by Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens and The University of Akron, the library, as part of a larger partnership, Summit County and the Great War. More information on this collaboration and the film may be found at www.summitwwi.org. The Ohio Humanities, a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, helped made the documentary possible.
