Inspired by mozart's question, I would like to ask where Woodrow Wilson went on 29 December 1918 and why it was so important to him personally.

Wilson was in Carlisle, England, speaking at his grandfather's church. A quotation from that speech:

"It is from quiet places like this all over the world that the forces accumulate which presently will overbear any attempt to accomplish evil on a large scale. Like the rivulets gathering into the river, and the river into the seas, there come from communities like this streams that fertilize the consciences of men, and it is the conscience of the world that we are trying to place upon the throne which others would usurp."

He chose his venue well for such a speech. Carlisle is in Cumbria (Cumberland) and is close by the Lake District and its National Park, up in the North West of England near the Scots border. ( It's also subject to a lot of flooding, but that may not be the 'rivulets' that he had in mind ! )

Well done both of you! And so darn quick off the mark too I was born up there in Carlisle, you see, and this is part of what I grew up with.
But why, as the second part of my question asked, was his trip to Carlisle so special to him? I mean, he'd just been to London for important political talks, hadn't he, but why go all the way up to Carlisle, three hundred miles away? To see his grandfather's church, yes, but the plaque on the wall up there refers to - who?

Hi Colin,
Possibly to his mother, Jessie Woodrow, who was born in Carlisle?

Yes, his mother, dance girl - that's right! When I was a youngster growing up in Carlisle (population c70,000 - small-town UK par excellence), the fact that the mother of an actual president of the US of A had been born there was amazing to us youngsters. Seeing mozart's earlier post brought it all back. Carlisle's famous for other things too of course, including the recent floods to which Fred refers. My sisters and brothers in law suffered from those, believe me. My mother-in law escaped.
Fuse, you got it more or less, truth to tell: just the mother thing and the plaque.
Great answers all.