Was just going to edit...WWII. Got about three hours sleep last night. 
I don't think I ever heard anybody talk about WWI at all, even though I remember people who served.
World War II was worse in terms of loss of life and scope, but it wasn't a patch on the actual conditions the soldiers faced in World War I. My great uncles that were in WWII wouldn't tell me anything until I had joined the military - against their vigorous protests - and then they told me damn near everything they could remember, as I was then part of the "club".
When I got home from Desert Storm, 3 of them and I spent an entire weekend drunk, spinning yarns and telling tales. It was an interesting experience...They treated me as if I had been of their generation from that point forward.
Years later, back in Illinois, I was at the pub and the owner's dad was in from out of town. He was a Vietnam vet, and had never really "come home". I was introduced to him as a veteran, and we got to drinking and talking. He mentioned, gesturing around with his glass, that nobody around us had any clue as to what goes on in the world. I replied that this was because
we did our job, and that a population ignorant of the horrors of war was a GOOD thing, and also the best commendation a soldier could ever recieve.
I was later told by Eric, the pub's owner, that his father had relaxed after that, for the first time that Eric could ever remember. I've kind of felt good about that ever since.