Got Doughboy? The Great War in the Great Valley and Sacramento History Photo of the Week, Number 28...

Think about it. Not since the 14th century's Black Death had Europe experienced such a monumental loss of life. The plague claimed one of every three European. Worldwide, the Great War One killed 16 million people. It also formed the nexus of where the time-tested tactics and strategies of the Little Corporal met the buzzsaw of technology.

And though an ocean and continent away, the War touched Sacramento in so many ways. On Thursday night at the Central Library, a few days before Veterans' Day, on November 5, from 6:00 to 8:00, we will talk about World War One and how it came to claim a spot in the Sacramento Valley for nearly two years. The ways in which we ate, worked, learned, spent and related to one another were all affected.

The photo above is of the 1917 Cadet Corps at Sacramento High School. In the spring of 1918, Sac High and several other area high schools, gathered their forces at Del Paso Park near present day Auburn and Watt Avenues to learn how to make war. The exercises lasted for a week.

This photo and many more like it can be found in the Sacramento Public Library’s Sacramento Room which is open to the public Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday 1 to 5, and Thursday 1 to 8.

Sacramento History Photo(s) of the Week: Issue No. 20!

In August 1903, Edward and Augusta Sullivan gave birth to a child at 1100 “E” Street, deciding to name her Helen. Above is Helen Sullivan in her 1922 graduation photo from Sacramento High School. Following school, she spent the next ten years working as a telephone operator and stenographer for the State of California, and was married in 1933 to Tipton Randolph. Helen lived at both 1100 and 1110 at different times from birth through her late-20s.

Helen’s father, Edward, was a blacksmith for Southern Pacific. Her grandmother and grandfather, Peter and Mary, moved to Sacramento from New York state. All of the Sullivan boys, a total of three, and the senior Sullivan, worked for the railroad. Edward and Peter died within five months of one another in 1915, Edward of typhoid fever in August and Peter of a stroke in April. Both are buried at the Old City Cemetery. Etched on Edward’s grave is the word “Papa.”

Helen spent her latter years living in East Sacramento after residing for nearly two decades just outside the Alkali at Seventeenth and “G.” She died in May 1990.

This photo and many more like it can be found in the Sacramento Public Library’s Sacramento Room which is open to the public Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday 1 to 5, and Thursday 1 to 8.