ers, which ranged from four million
individuals in the first loan to more than twenty-one millions in the
fourth. Equally notable, as indicating the educative effect of the war
and of the sale of these Liberty Bonds, was the successful effort to
encourage thrift. War Savings societies were instituted and children
saved their pennies and nickels to buy twenty-five cent "thrift stamps"
which might be accumulated to secure interest-bearing savings
certificates. Down to November 1, 1918, the sale of such stamps totalled
$834,253,000, with a maturity value of more than a billion dollars.

The successful organizing of national resources to supply military
demands obviously depended, in the last instance, upon the education of
the people to a desire for service and sacrifice. The Liberty Loan
campaigns, the appeals of Hoover, and the Fuel Administration, all were
of importance in producing such morale. In addition the Council of
National Defense, through the Committee on Public Information, spread
pamphlets emphasizing the issues of the war and the objects for which we
were fighting. At every theater and moving-picture show, in the factories
during the noon hours, volunteer speakers told briefly of the needs of
the Government and appealed for cooeperation. These were the so-called
"Four Minute Men." The most noted artists gave their talent to covering
the billboards with patriotic and informative posters. Blue Devils who
had fought at Verdun, captured tanks, and airplanes, were paraded in
order to bring home the realities of the life and death struggle in which
America was engaged. The popular response was inspiring. In the face of
the national enthusiasm the much-vaunted plans of the German Government
for raising civil disturbance fell to the ground. Labor was sometimes
disorganized by German propaganda; destruction of property or war
material was accomplished by German agents; and valuable information
sometimes leaked out to the enemy. But the danger was always kept in
check by the Department of Justice and also by a far-reaching citizen
organization, the American Protective League. Equally surprising was the
lack of opposition to the war on the part of pacifists and socialists. It
was rare to find the "sedition" for which some of them were punished,
perhaps over-promptly, translated from words to actions.

* * * * *

The organization of the industrial resources of the nation was
complicated