Caption for photo (left to right) - Jimmy Mendoza, Dcn. John Donart, Alex Rickert, Dominic Victor, Mark Dold, Trey Niesen, John Weber (front), Drew Stanley, Dcn. Will Sutherland, Zane Roberts
Mark Dold, from our Serra club and John Weber from the Johnson County Serra club hosted eight of our Seminarians for a tour and lunch at the WWI Memorial and Museum. John is a Tour Guide at the Museum and gave the Seminarians a private tour. click the Blue Button for details...
On Monday December 22, 2025 eight seminarians from the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas visited The National World War 1 Museum and Memorial. Dcn. Will Sutherland, Dcn. John Donart, Alex Rickert, Trey Niesen, Dominic Victor, Drew Stanley, Zane Roberts and Jimmy Mendoza were hosted by Serrans Mark Dold (KCK club) and John Weber (JOCO club).
We met for lunch in the Over There Café. Mark Dold gave the history of the Liberty Memorial and how the WW1 Museum came to be in Kansas City. The men learned about the political situation in Europe that led up to the war. They learned about the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance, and how the assassination of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne led to multiple countries declaring war on each other within a month.
After initial German success invading France through Belgium, the war quickly stalemated into trench warfare on the Western Front. For almost three years the battle lines moved very little. Trench warfare was brutal and many millions of soldiers and civilians lost their lives. On the Eastern Front Russia fought Germany and Austria-Hungary and many millions more were killed. Colonial troops allied with England, France, and Germany joined the fighting and the “Great War” became truly a world war.
World War 1 was the first modern, “industrialized” war and saw the advent of the machine gun, poison gas, tanks, aerial warfare, and submarines. The first half of the museum details the years 1914-1917 and the second half (after the USA enters the war) documents 1917-1919.
We also visited the lower level of the museum where there is a display of World War 1 artifacts used by military chaplains, including a field altar kit, chalice, and patten. These are part of an “open storage” display concept that debuted at the WW1 Museum two years ago, where hundreds of artifacts are displayed behind glass panels.
The idea for this tour originated at the Serra Clubs visit to Kenrick-Glennon Seminary last October. Over dinner Serrans Mark Dold and John Weber were visiting with Dcn. Will Sutherland and Drew Stanley and collectively came up with the idea. Dold has been a volunteer at the museum since 2014 and is an experienced tour guide; Weber has been a volunteer since 2020 and is in training to become a tour guide. Weber and Sutherland worked on putting the final plans together culminating in the visit on 12/22.
It was our great privilege hosting the seminarians, and getting to spend three quality hours with them! The seminarians’ time is precious during their visits home and I’m glad we were able to make this happen.
Submitted by John Weber