of trade and endangered the boost the war had brought to the American economy, the opinions of the powers that be shifted, but declaring war alone did not bring support from the population at large.
Enthusiasm for the war effort was so lackluster that although it was estimated that 1 million men were needed to fight, only 73,000 had enlisted after the first six weeks. The draft was instituted and the CPI went to work “disseminating information designed to sustain morale in the United States and in the Allied and neutral countries and administering voluntary press censorship.”17
Thousands of speakers called “four minute men” were organized to give short talks, often in movie theaters, in 5,000 cities all over America. The Division of Syndicate Features was established and over fifty prominent writers and journalists, including Samuel Hopkins Adams, Booth Tarkington, Wallace Irwin, and Rex Beach, were given the responsibility “to make clear why we are at war and to explain the ideals for which we are fighting.” There was the Division of Women’s Work to encourage women to support the war in tangible ways as well as accept the fact that it was their husbands and sons who were going to do the fighting. There was even a Bureau of Cartoons “to sell the war” and weekly bulletins stressing government priorities were sent to over 750 cartoonists throughout the country. And while official newsreels were distributed to theaters and daily news bulletins were issued to the press, censorship was always carefully and calculatingly called “voluntary.”
The Committee on Public Information quickly became a quintessential part of this new America—a leader in world affairs, no longer isolated from the intrigues of Europe—and in the name of national unity, the government actively promoted one way of thinking and suppressed dissent as well. There were sporadic objections from a variety of quarters, but this cooperation between the government and the press was seen by many as the natural result of patriotism at a time of national crisis. And with 200 employees, a budget of $5 million, and more than 25,000 volunteers working under his auspices, George Creel, dubbed “America’s Super-Publicist,” had become a very powerful man.18
Frances was familiar with George Creel as a reporter, editor, and populist reformer. In Kansas City, he had helped focus attention on local corruption and in Denver he gave national coverage to the killing of mine workers. His analysis of ten states that had “given” women the vote proclaimed the benefits of women’s suffrage so convincingly that it was reprinted in pamphlet form by the National Woman Suffrage Association. He endeared himself to the administration with “Wilson and the Issues” in 1916, and in “A Close-up of Douglas Fairbanks” for Everybody’s Magazine, Creel created out of whole cloth a Fairbanks who had never existed before: a youth with enviable choices who intended to go to Princeton but picked Harvard instead, a grinning optimist, and a one-man band of moviemaking, facing death-defying feats with a constant smile.19
Frances knew the real Fairbanks too well to have any illusions about George Creel and she arrived at his office to find a short man in his early forties, dressed in flashy clothes and clearly very full of himself. His opening comments reflected his amazement at her attractiveness and youth. He had expected a much older woman since he knew her only by reputation, from letters of recommendations, and from her résumé, which emphasized her years as head of a scenario department, Mary Pickford’s writer, and her experience as a reporter and artist.
Creel told her she was pretty enough to be an actress like his wife, Blanche Bates, who had just made her screen debut in The Border Legion with Hobart Bosworth. His wife had come from the New York stage and he regaled Frances with stories aimed to impress her, but failed miserably.20
She tried to keep her irritation to herself until Joseph Tumulty, the president’s personal secretary, joined the meeting. Although he clearly “had an eye for the ladies,” Tumulty took her seriously and talked about the assignment. Still he told her he hesitated to approve her appointment because it was dangerous at the front and women of experience and substance, such as Mary Roberts Rinehart, were needed to serve in these positions.
Frances informed him that she was a friend of Mary Roberts Rinehart; if Mrs. Rinehart personally recommended her, would he reconsider and sign her commission? Tumulty reappraised the young woman, made note of “the resolve behind her eyes,” and concluded that she was “a rare, rare person, possessing a divine flame.” He assured Frances that he would look upon her appointment favorably with such an endorsement.21
Mary Roberts Rinehart’s husband was stationed as an army physician just outside Washington and Mary happened to be in town visiting him when she and Frances literally ran into each other at the White House. Mary had trained as a nurse before taking up writing and she wanted to return to France in that capacity. Even though she reached 2 million people through her articles in the Saturday Evening Post, she craved the tangible feeling of accomplishment that nursing the wounded brought and she was in the process of trying to cut through the red tape that forbade a woman with two sons serving overseas to go over herself.
Rinehart was enthusiastic about Frances’s being a correspondent and agreed to speak to Tumulty, whom she had come to know as the man who stood between President Wilson “and the men who would use him,” respecting him as “staunch, shrewd, and loyal.” She personally visited him and Creel to vouch for Frances’s ability and tenacity and when her official appointment came through, Frances thanked the “generous, warm-hearted woman” profusely and went to New York to await further instructions.22
Frances’s assignment was big news. There was a full-page spread in Moving Picture World, two pages with pictures in Motion Picture Magazine, and a smattering of articles in the newspapers. Mary Pickford was “tearfully refusing to even discuss the necessity of getting another scenario writer” because “I am losing my best friend, the dearest chum I ever had.” Frances was painted as brave and spirited for being willing to serve and it was noted that she was relinquishing a $50,000-a-year salary in order to volunteer.23
Finally, on the cold, rainy morning of September 18, 1918, Frances joined more than nine hundred men of the 543rd Engineers Service Battalion on Pier 57 at the New York Harbor to board the Rochambeau, converted into a transport vessel and destined for Bordeaux with a convoy of other ships.
Frances thought the Rochambeau looked like “an old tub” and her fears proved justified when after two days at sea, “we hit a storm and the storm hit us back.” Waves poured across the deck and the ship was slapped from side to side by the raging ocean. Everyone was told to stay belowdecks, and Frances was lying scared and alone in her tiny cabin when from down in the hold, where the nineteen “colored troops” were housed, she heard “majestic voices rising in spirituals.”24
The Rochambeau had been forced so far off course that they landed on the northern coast of France at Brest instead of Bordeaux as planned. Everything about the transport was supposed to be secret, including Frances’s presence, so as she walked down the gangplank, “I was thunderstruck when I saw Fred Thomson standing there.” He had been in France only a week, but when he heard that a ship was about to dock unexpectedly in nearby Brest, he asked Colonel Fanoff, who had met Frances at Camp Kearney, for a one-day pass based on “a strange premonition” that she might be on board. Frances did not know if she or the colonel was more surprised when Fred brought her back to camp, but it reconfirmed to her that fate was indeed playing a hand in this relationship. Fred seemed so sure of her presence, and the comfort they had felt with each other in California was further entrenched.25
The next day, Frances headed for Paris to report to the CPI headquarters. She was made a lieutenant in the army and given her papers, including a pass signed by General Pershing, an officer’s uniform, a steel helmet, and a regulation belt with a gas mask attached. She was assigned to work with Harry Thorpe, one of Doug Fairbanks’s former cameramen, and Wesley Ruggles, a fledgling director from Hollywood now in the Army Signal Corps. She had known them slightly
