Agenda Items will include updates and reviews of recent past activities such as our booth at the Fair, sponsorship of Alaska Protective Witness, ongoing activities such as the bus ad, Future activities including potential celebration of International Day of Peace on Sept. 21, Armistice Day Celebration Nov. 11, and more.
If you would like to help the movement for peace, please show up.
Around 25 people gathered together on November 11 to commemorate Armistice Day with songs and bell-ringing. After an eloquent introduction by Maia we rang our bells. Then the Fairbanks Peace Choir led us in songs of peace and hope. Finally we went around our circle with everyone giving a concise statement of what Armistice Day means to them. We were all inspired to follow the original meaning of Armistice Day and rededicate ourselves to the pursuit of peace.
The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner front page article about the event is reproduced below:
Bells rang out at 11:11 a.m. at Veterans Memorial Park as two dozen people gathered to celebrate Armistice Day and hope for peace.
Hosted by the Alaska Peace Center and Veterans for Peace, people bundled up in the 1-degree weather to rededicate themselves to work toward peace in the world. They assemble every year on Nov. 11 to ring bells for a full minute.
Bells rang out to announce the armistice between Allied nations and Germany to end the fighting during World War I on 11 a.m. on Nov. 11, 2018. Armistice Day was celebrated on Nov. 11 for many years until it was renamed to Veterans Day in the U.S. in 1954.
Maia Genaux, of the Alaska Peace Center, led the ringing, stating, “Let our bells today call out to the beauty, the harmony, the relationships and all that thrives in peace. Let our bells call us now and lead us in our work for healing.”
The Fairbanks Peace Choir led participants in singing “Dona Nobis Pachem,” which means “Give Us Peace” in Latin, and “This is my song (Finlandia)” by Jean Sibelius.
Residents shared their hopes for peace in the future. They encouraged one another to love and talk to their neighbors.
One woman said that she is transmitting her rage into art and love for Fairbanks. “Now is the time of artists,” she said.
“One of the strangest stories that we tell ourselves is that war is inevitable. It’s not,” one man said.
Alaska Peace Center and Veterans For Peace North Star Chapter 146 invite the Fairbanks community to ring bells at 11:00 am at Veterans Memorial Park, 700 Cushman Street in Fairbanks, in celebration of Armistice Day on Monday, November 11. Bring a bell if you have one (we’ll have extras if you don’t), in any case bring a friend. The Peace Choir will be present to lead us in some songs.
Bell-ringing has been a traditional way of celebrating Armistice Day ever since the end of World War One (known at the time as “The Great War”) 106 years ago. It signifies the relief and joy felt around the world when the Armistice was signed on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. Bells were rung to celebrate peace and the end of four years of war that killed or wounded more than 21 million people. In the wake of so much carnage, it was then clear to millions of people that wars were not about valor or romantic ideals, but about empire, which benefits a few at the expense of many. A tradition of observing the anniversary of the Armistice by ringing bells to honor veterans and promote peace spread throughout the world.
Armistice Day was first officially recognized by Congress in 1926 as a day that “should be commemorated with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises designed to perpetuate peace through good will and mutual understanding between nations,” and “with appropriate ceremonies of friendly relations with all other peoples.” It became a legal holiday nationwide by an act of Congress in 1938, dedicated to the cause of world peace. In 1954 Congress changed the name of the holiday from Armistice Day to Veterans Day. In his proclamation on the first Veterans Day in 1954, President Eisenhower admonished Americans to “reconsecrate ourselves to the task of promoting an enduring peace so that their efforts shall not have been in vain.” However, in contrast to Eisenhower’s intention, rebranding Armistice Day as Veterans Day has led to a change from celebrating peace to celebrating the military and glorifying war. Armistice Day has been flipped from a day for peace into a day for displays of militarism.
According to Wikipedia there are currently 56 separate armed conflicts going on in the world, with a combined death toll of 176,993 men, women, and children so far this year. Chief among these in our current consciousness is the horrific ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza. For over a year, unspeakable atrocities have filled our screens and haunted our consciences. The US government is complicit in Israel’s merciless campaign of ethnic cleansing. The bombs that Israel drops on Palestinian children and their parents are made in the USA and provided by the US government. Israel’s US-backed war has now expanded to the West Bank, to Lebanon and to Iran, risking a wider war that could even go nuclear.
The Alaska Peace Center, along with Veterans For Peace nationally and locally, celebrates the original intent of November 11th – as a day to rededicate ourselves to work toward peaceful solutions to the world’s problems. Peace, not war, is the best way to honor the sacrifices of veterans. We are not free until we are all free!
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International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICANW)
World Beyond War Peace Pledge Endorser
Forge Swords into Plowshares
Total Cost of War on Terror
September 11, 2001 to November 4, 2025:
$10,574,197,412,827
This figure includes expenses for military, homeland security, veterans' care,
and interest on the war debt, but does not include future veterans' care or future interest.
Alaska Peace Center 