The CTCA was formed in April 1917 to supervise the cultural life of the military service men. After the declaration of war, the military training camps increased two, three, and four times their normal size. As a result, men from all walk of life where thrown together as they moved from state to state, country to country, while being trained. The image that many civili

As the CTCA took over the social life of civilian communities, the adrenaline rush from the power that they possessed at their fingertip form the federal government began to kick in and take off. As Bristow explains, the CTCA took on the paternalistic qualities of the Progressive reform, despite their emphasis on a fair democracy. They told the soldiers and the civilians what movies they could watch, and what activities they could participate in. They were determined to make the soldiers of World War I good, decent and respectful citizens. The camps included a large percentage of working class men, African Americans, and immigrants. Because of the diversity of the troops, it was feared that the nation’s diversity would weaken the war effort. The CTCA wanted to produce new “Americans” with white, middle class values, an attempt that ultimately blew up in their faces and turned many against the Commission on Training camp Activities.

The main objective of the CTCA was to rid the troops of veneral diseases by introducing them to the concepts and advantages of sexual purity and abstinence. The Commission provided the men with an array of wholesome leisure activities ranging from sports to theater to well-regulated dances and library books that were censored for their benefits. Their hope was that the war would act as an engine for social change. When the men were demobilized, they would become a crusader for progressive values in their hometowns, and push their beliefs and values on all that would listen, even those that would not. That, as we will later see, would not be the case.

“ The relationship between progressivism and the African American community had always been complexed and troubled.” The D

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