It is for me a pleasure and a real honor to be asked by this society to give the annual address.

I appreciate this distinc- tion not alone because as a member of the society and of its executive council I am deeply interested in its work, but more distinctly because it gives me an opportunity to talk to an audi- ence interested in history about a type of service which I con- ceive will have a unique place in the history of the World War.

It gives me an opportunity also to say to you, my friends and neighbors, that while doing a part of this national task I have been able to maintain the same standards that I have set for myself both as a member of the history department of the University of Minnesota and as a member of this society.

I am pleased not the less that it gives me an opportunity also to say that I have followed your work even during the busy days in Washington and have seen with pleasure that the Minne- sota Historical Society has been among the first to begin gath- ering the records of the war and that it is making its prepara- tions against that day when the history of Minnesotas part in the great struggle must be written.

The thing that has most engaged mens attention and im- pressed their imaginations in this world-wide conflict has been the massing of armies and the accumulation of war material to an extent hitherto unknown.