_Photo by Signal Corps_ A. E. F. STUDENTS IN UNIVERSITY OF LYON] Three men--Private Hudson Hawley, Field Clerk James A. Britt, and Corporal John T. Winterich--were the founders of the _Stars and Stripes_. All three had had training in the making of newspapers--Winterich had been one of the editors of the Springfield _Republican_. At Neufchâteau one winter night early in 1918 these three foregathered to descant upon the growing American Expeditionary Forces and--like the fraternity of reporters the world over--to talk shop; and these men agreed that the chief need of the expedition was an agency which might put the various American military elements in France in touch with each other, tell every man what the expanding force was like and what it was trying to do, and build homogeneity and singleness of purpose within the expedition such as no other agency could evoke--in short, the A. E. F. needed a newspaper. The idea was communicated to General Pershing, who promptly approved it. Thus was the _Stars and Stripes_ officially born. The first number was published in Paris on February 8, 1918, and regularly every Friday thereafter the paper appeared until June 13, 1919, when it was discontinued, and the editorial staff joined the homeward migration. At its summit of popularity the _Stars and Stripes_ attained to a circulation of 526,000, which was close to the permitted limit of one copy for every three soldiers in the expedition, a stricture made necessary by the shortage of paper in Europe. This was all paid circulation, obtained without direct solicitation other than the advertising appearing in the paper itself. The _Stars and Stripes_ was printed in the Paris plant of the London _Daily Mail_. The total net profit earned by the newspaper was about $700,000, a sum which went to the credit of the Quartermaster Department. After the armistice the collectors in America awoke to the historical value of this publication and offered large sums for the few complete files which had been saved.