ABSTRACT
In June 1914, the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria sparked war between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. Soon most of the world was engaged in World War I, which killed unprecedented numbers of men. Entry onto the world stage in the 1880s and 1890s—the era of imperialism—brought the United States into contact with European nations in a new way. In 1919, a worldwide influenza epidemic, spread by wartime travel, eventually killed between fifty and one hundred million people, while fears of communism fanned the Red Scare in the United States. By 1939 German tanks began to roll across Europe. As they had before World War I, most Americans preferred to stay out of the conflict, but sold weapons to England. As American men and women marched off to war, those who remained on the home front became involved in the war effort.
