At 11 a.m. on the 11th day of the 11th month, a bell rang out eleven times at the Buffalo and Erie County Military and Naval Park commemorating the end of the "War to End All Wars."
"I never thought about war and then when I went over there, I had no politics, when I went over there it changed everything. I realized I had to think about everything I was doing," said Russell Brown, a Vietnam War veteran.
Brown was one of the people who came out to mark the anniversary. He says his time as marine in Vietnam changed his whole view of Armistice Day.
"It's celebrating the war machine, pretty much. It honors veterans too, I don't mean that part's not there, but it really is celebrating war and it gets people all worked up for the war machine and 'let's go get em.' The original thing was to end all wars," said Brown.
In addition to marking the centennial, peace advocates read the names of more than 40 school children killed when a school bus was bombed in Yemen earlier the year, reportedly by Saudi's with a US-made plane and bomb.
"This is a day for honoring peace. We want to reclaim it for focusing on peace," said Victoria Ross, WNY Peace Center executive director.
Ross heads the Western New York Peace Center. She says the purpose of the vigil is to honor veterans and call for an end to war.
"Veterans pay the price, their families pay the price, we all pay the price, people who are killed overseas in wars or injured, and also by all the resources that are going into all of that war making that should be used for life sustaining efforts," said Victoria Ross.
Brown says just as we pause to honor our veterans we should also pause to think about what we can do to make sure there's never another war.
"People take time out of their say to think about war and think about what they've done in the past year to help end it," said Brown.