Wwi Facts

A baboon called Jackie became a private in the South African army in World War I.

Sergeant Alvin York came home from World War I as a national hero. Hollywood wanted his story, and he said no for over 20 years. With only nine months of schooling himself, he raised money for a high school in his Tennessee mountain county and mortgaged his home twice to pay its teachers. A century after he broke ground, it still teaches the county's kids.

Winnie-the-Pooh was a real bear. Harry Colebourn, a Canadian soldier headed to WWI, bought an orphaned cub for $20 at a train stop in 1914 and named her Winnipeg. When he shipped out to France, he left her at London Zoo, so gentle that keepers let a boy named Christopher Robin climb into her enclosure and feed her condensed milk. He renamed his teddy bear after her.