Immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbour, American capitalism and racist jingoism met and fell in love. Their offspring was a flood of dime-store tat that was fed to the public in an ultimately successful attempt to stir feeling enough that they were prepared to spend whatever it took to defeat the Empire of Japan. Here is an example from my collection of a postcard printed for that purpose.
Here’s a second variation on the sheet music for that classic agi-prop song, “We’re gonna have to slap the Dirty Little Jap”. The other one I have is here, and the record is here. The lengths the US Government had to go to get the US people fired up for war were pretty extreme at times and resorted to gross caricature and racism in most cases.
Another simple bit of propaganda, mocking the Fuhrer. Looking at the material that propagandists used to attack the Germans, it focused mostly on Adolf Hitler. He was characterised as being a carpet biter, portrayed as a monkey or a rat or, as in this example, there was a toilet joke in there somewhere. This looks mid-war American, unofficial and designed for the home front. Let’s say it together, Fuck Hitler.
Very cool items here. This is a pair of medium sized posters I obtained from Henrik in Germany. He told me that a civil servant has retired who had found these in storage in the 70’s. Crisp edges, appropriate spotting, all as you would expect. The text translates to “One People, One Nation, One Leader”. The poster was printed by the offset printer Carl Werner of Reichenbach. By the way, fuck Hitler!
Kiwi Medals 