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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

100 years ago at Camp Lewis: As Washington soldiers train for World War I, they get fed well for Thanksgiving

A correspondent at Camp Lewis (later known as Fort Lewis) assured everyone at home that the boys were being well-fed for Thanksgiving, The Spokesman-Review reported on Nov. 29, 1917. (Spokesman-Review archives)

Thanksgiving Day had a bittersweet feel in 1917, because so many Spokane men were training in Army camps.

However, a correspondent at Camp Lewis (later known as Fort Lewis) assured everyone at home that the boys were being fed well.

“No parent with a son at this cantonment, no sister whose brother is enrolled and no wife whose husband is in this big business of training need be worried about the national army lacking dainties,” wrote Robert A. Glen.

He wrote that the Army “cooks and their helpers at this moment are deep in the savory mysteries of sauces and seasoning.”

“In fact, so far as the gastronomic end of the holiday is concerned, ‘everything is lovely and the goose hangs high,’ ” wrote Glen, quoting a popular phrase of the era.

Not only that, many men had received packages from home, so they were able to supplement their Army-issued turkey dinner with “several tons of cakes, cookies, fruit, candies, figs, dates and every conceivable sweet product of orchard and oven.”

Closer to home, nearly all of the men stationed at Fort George Wright were eating Thanksgiving dinners in local homes. The citizens of Spokane had swamped Fort George Wright with Thanksgiving invitations – double the number of men stationed there.