On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918, bells rang around the world.
The war was over. The fighting had stopped. The boys were coming home.
Bells across the globe will toll again Sunday, 100 years after the signing of the armistice and the end of World War I. On all U.S. Navy and Marine ships and installations, at landmarks around the country and from the towers of Chicago’s churches, they’ll ring at 11 a.m. local time to honor those who sacrificed their lives to achieve that historic moment of peace.
“The bells were silenced during the war,” said Tim Noonan, a Beverly resident who worked with the national World War I Centennial Commission to bring the Bells of Peace initiative to Chicago. “Now this was kind of a jubilation, a celebration of peace.”
This Veterans Day, the 100th anniversary of the armistice signed between the Allies of World War I and Germany, it’s important to remember the millions of American families who sent their sons and daughters to serve their country overseas, said Dan Dayton, executive director of the commission. Veterans Day is being observed on Monday, but the anniversary is Sunday, Nov. 11.
“It marked the beginning of the American century,” he said. “It was a war that really did change the world.”
