Cincinnati Portraits from World War I

In December 1918, just a month after World War I’s end, the US and Allied Governments War Exposition at Music Hall celebrated the Allied Victory and the Cincinnatians who served. The Expo featured more than 6,000 photographs of area servicemen and women, loaned by local families, as well as uniforms, flags and more. After the Expo, 2,625 of those photographs were donated to the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, the predecessor to CMC’s Cincinnati History Library & Archives.

Until We Meet Again: Cincinnati Portraits from World War I features 80 original photographs from that collection, and some of the letters that accompanied them. And, like the Expo in 1918, there will be a selection of Gold Star Service Members. Photographs of women who served, mostly in the service of the Red Cross, are also included in the exhibition.

A U.S. Army uniform and a Red Cross Uniform from CMC’s collections supplement the photographs, along with service flags, posters and pieces of ephemera from the Expo.

Until We Meet Again: Cincinnati Portraits from World War I opens June 28, 2019, the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Versailles that officially ended the war.

Until We Meet Again: Cincinnati Portraits from World War I is presented in partnership with FotoFocus.