The Evening Missourian. [volume] (Columbia, Mo.) 1917-1920, 1919-01-14
DR.. H. D. HOOKER SEES
PARIS CELEBRATION
Like a Carnival, He Says
When Armistice Was
Signed Nov. II.
WORKING WITH GAS
NJ. u. Professor Was Trying
New Method of Treating
Victims.

Dr. II. d. Hooker, assistant profes-
Sor of horticulture in the University
is one of the few persons now in the
United States who was in Paris at the
time the armistice was signed.
Doctor Hooker was doing research
work at Yale University and joined the
gas defense service a year ago last
September. Later he entered the
chemical warfare service and was
commissioned a lieutenant last Sep
tember.
His work has been experimenting
with a perfected treatment in this
country for victims of gas. He and
three associates, one of them Carl
Greene, son of DR.. C. W. Greene, for
merly a professor of physiological
chemistry in the University, were sent
overseas last September to try the
treatment out in the hospitals behind
the lines.
Doctor Hooker was stationed in a
laboratory in PuteauX, but on Novem-
ber IL when he learned of the sign
ing of the armistice, he took the tram
way into Paris.
The thing characteristic of the
the armistice was signed was more
like a huge carnival than anything
else" Doctor Hooker said. THE ar
mistice was signed about o'clock in
the morning, but everything was kept
quiet until IL o'clock, when it took
effect Just at that hour, cannOns
began to boom all over the city and
the celebration broke loose.
The Kissing a Feature.
French people was the way they
would clasp each other about the neck
and kiss one another. Some of the
American soldiers stood laughing at
a French private kissing his major.
The Frenchman turned around and
saw them laughing. He Immediately
started for the whole bunch with in
tent to kiss them quiet.
Some of the army chaplains who
id not entirely approve of that man
ner of celebration soon found them
selves surrounded by a group of
French girls and had to kiss their way
out.
Little punches of people would join
hands and start winding down the
streets. The French had stored a
number of captured guns, airplanes
and other equipment in the Place de
la Concord, one of the main parks
of the city. AS each little group went
by, the celebratOrs would dray away
one or two of the smaller mounted
guns.
Some of the French officials OBJ
jected to this practice, but one old
commander said, Let them take them.
There are plenty more where they
came from
American soldiers managed to get
a number of big army trucks and drove
all over the city making their engines
back fire with every revolution. One
truck load drove up to the monument
at the place of the old Bastile. They
made the front wheels climb up the
steps at the base until the car stood
almost on end. Then they turned the
searchlight on the statute above and
sang THE Star Spangled Banner" un-
til hOarse.
Every Store Lit Up.
"One big thing noticeable was that
on Monday night, November IL, for the
first time i'm years, every store and
store window was lit up. 1t was no
longer necessary that Paris be city
of darkness to guard against bonn
bardments.
Everybody in Paris was out on the
streets.
THE different nationalities dress
ed up in their native costumes and |
paraded up and down the streets. In
one place bunch of youngsters car
rying a white flag went around shout
in, Long live the king" but some
body soon put stop to that"
Lieutenant Hooker came home |
through London the week following. |
The crowds in London, he said, had |
been more rough than those in Paris |
and had actually done some damage |
to buildings and monuments in that |
city.
Lieutenant Hooker returned to the |
United States on the Mauretania, the |
first ship to leave a European port aft
er the armistice was signed.