The United States. Volume 1, Number 1 of The American Legion Weekly debuted on July 4, 1919, just a few months after the Legion’s organizing caucuses in Paris and St. Louis. The cover featured the text of a congratulatory telegram from Gen. Pershing in France. The opening editorial, "The Spirit of the Legion," began: "THE AMERICAN LEGION WEEKLY is born on this one hundred and forty-third anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Appropriately so. The principles and ideals of that epochal document in human liberty are those of The American Legion, which the American Legion Weekly represents."

Read the entire first issue here. All issues of the Weekly, which ran through June 1926, are now available in The American Legion Digital Archive. Progress continues on making available all past issues of Legion publications.