1918
year
1918 (MCMXVIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar, the 1918th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 918th year of the 2nd millennium, the 18th year of the 20th century, and the 9th year of the 1910s decade. As of the start of 1918, the Gregorian calendar was 13 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.
The ceasefire that effectively ended the First World War took place on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of this year. Also in this year, the Spanish flu pandemic killed 50–100 million people worldwide.
In Russia, this year runs with only 352 days. As the result of Julian to Gregorian calendar switch, 13 days needed to be skipped. Wednesday, January 31 (Julian Calendar) was immediately followed by Thursday, February 14 (Gregorian Calendar).
Events
World War I will be abbreviated as "WWI"
January
January – 1918 flu pandemic: The "Spanish flu" (influenza) is first observed in Haskell County, Kansas.
January 4 – The Finnish Declaration of Independence is recognized by Soviet Russia, Sweden, Germany and France.
January 8 – American president Woodrow Wilson presents the Fourteen Points as a basis for peace negotiations to end the war.
The public source identifies “1918” as year. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around year.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “1918”, the useful work is to connect “year” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2094. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1918 and 1923.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “1918”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow 1918 primary sources, 1918 archive and year research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “1918” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.