Kiwanis remembers veterans of wars oft forgotten

Frank Buckles, the last surviving American World War I veteran, died more than two years ago at 110.

But at last Thursday’s Kiwanis Club of Longboat Key meeting, Weldon Frost, who in 2011 visited more than 20 cemeteries in France from World War II, pulled a list out of his pocket to show how many lives were lost during World War I in honor of Memorial Day:
United States — 116,708
Great Britain — 886,939
Canada — 64,976
Australia — 61,966
France — 1,397,800
Russia — 1,811,000
Italy — 651,000
Germany — 2,050,897
Austria — 1,100,000

The total, including small countries allied with one side or the other: 9,722,620 military deaths for World War I. That is in addition to 6,821,248 direct and indirect civilian deaths.

Frost shared the list to ask that members remember all veterans on Memorial Day as surviving veterans die.