Saturday, May 26, 1945. The Homecoming.

The Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) was transferred from Rheims to Frankfurt-am-Main.

The Saturday Evening Post featured Norman Rockwell's "GI Homecoming" illustration that was soon used for a war bond poster.  It features in one of Sarah Sundin's articles on her blog site, and this is directly linked into that:

Extremely poignant, there's a lot going on in the illustration, from the "girl next door" peeking around the corner, to the fact that the returning soldier is returning to an extremely urban, and not very attractive apartment building, something very common of urban life at the time.

The Berlin Philharmonic gave its first performance since the end of the war in Europe.

" Soldiers of the 77th Inf. Div. walk past mud-clogged tanks parked by the side of the road on Okinawa. 26 May, 1945. 77th Infantry Division."

Allied forces occupied Bassein, Burma.

Aerial photograph of Tokyo burning after B-29 fire bombing mission, May 26, 1945.

It was my father's 16th birthday.

Last edition:

Friday, May 25, 1945. The Clock.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, 1945 at the movies, Army, Artillery, Battle of Odžak, Croatia, Kamikaze, Marriage, Movies, Operation Downfall, Operation Olympic, Operation Ten-Go, U.S. Navy, World War Two, Yugoslavia

Saturday, May 16, 1925.

Last edition:

Friday, May 15, 1925. Coolidge decides the Navy isn't a police force.

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Army, Calvin Coolidge, Indian Wars, Japan, Miles City Montana, Pearl Harbor Hawaii, Personalities, Prohibition, The Press, U.S. Navy

Saturday, April 18, 1925.

Last edition:

Wednesday, April 15 1925: The Introduction of a Trailblazing Highways Map Guide

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Automobiles, Blog Mirror, Maps, Transportation, Trucks

Thursday, November 6, 1924. The 100th Anniversary of Christopher Robin and Winey the Pooh.

Winston Churchill was named Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Nikola Pašić became Prime Minister of Yugoslavia for the second time.

Published on this date:

Calvin Coolidge issued a statement regarding his election:

November 05, 1924

It does not seem possible to me to make an adequate expression concerning the Presidency of the United States. No other honor equals it; no other responsibility approaches it. When it is conferred by an overwhelming choice of the American people and vote of the Electoral College, these are made all the greater.

I can only express my simple thanks to all those who have contributed to this result and plainly acknowledge that it has been brought to pass through the work of a Divine Providence, of which I am but one instrument. Such powers as I have I dedicate to the service of all my country and of all my countrymen.

In the performance of the duties of my office I cannot ask for anything more than the sympathetic consideration which my fellow-Americans have always bestowed upon me. I have no appeal, except to the common sense of all the people. I have no pledge except to serve them. I have no object except to promote their welfare.

Life Magazine came out with a cover featuring a Girl Scout.

The Irish Boundary Commission held its first meeting to come to an agreement of the dividing line between the Irish Free State and the United Kingdom.

Last edition:

Wednesday, November 5, 1924. Expelled from the Forbidden City.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1924 Election, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, Calvin Coolidge, China, Chinese Warlord Era, Manchukuo, Monarchy, Nellie Tayloe Ross, Thanksgiving, World War Two

Saturday, September 27, 1924. Politicin'

 

John W. Davis (standing center with white hair), candidate for president in 1924, with Clem L. Shaver, Democratic National Committee Chairman standing to his right.

Pres. Coolidge with Natl. Laundry Owner's Assn., 9/27/24

Pres. Coolidge with Natl. Assn. of Retail Druggists,

Coolidge with Natl. Assn. of Local Preachers of Methodist Episcopal Church, 9/27/24

"Bonus bar".

The Saturday magazines were out.  The Saturday Evening Post pictured a Rockwell of a downtrodden man and a dog.

County Gentleman featured a duck hunter freshening up his decoys.

Colliers featured a woman working on her car.

Governor Zheng Shiqi of China's Anhui province telegraphed China's President Cao Kun for military aid to resist the Fengtian troops.

Last edition:

Thursday, September 25, 1924. Theodore Roosevelt Jr. and the New York Governor's Race.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1924 Election, Democratic Party, Franklin Roosevelt, New York, Politics, Republican Party, Socialism

Saturday, August 30, 1924. Late summer scenes.

The Dawes Plan went into effect.

Germany replaced paper marks with a coin, due to hyperinflation.

Clashes with the Ku Klux Klan resulted in six deaths in Herrin Illinois.

The French High Commission of the Levant created Lebanese citizenship.

Edwards, Prince of Wales, met with Calvin Coolidge.

Saturday magazines were out.

Last edition:

Friday, August 29, 1924. The start of the Second Saudi-Hashemite War.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Dawes Plan, It was because of World War One, Kingdom of Hejaz, Monarchy, Saudi Arabia, Second Saudi-Hashemite War, Sultanate of Nejd

Saturday, April 29, 1944. More friendly fire, Raid on Truk, More German strikes in the Channel.

Just a few days after U.S. ships shelled US Army troops at Slapton Sands in Operation Tiger in a friendly fire incident, the PT-346 was sunk, killing nine sailors and wounding nine, by Marine Corps Corsairs.

Lieutenant James Burk ordered medic John Frkovich to take his Burk's life jacket so he could survive and treat the wounded. Wilbur Larsen, USNR, received the Navy Marine Corps medal for saving wounded non-swimmer Forrest May's life.

Japanese torpedo bomber making a run on the Yorktown in a counter to the attack on Truk.

An American air raid on Truk destroyed most of the island's Japanese aircraft.

On New Guinea, the captured Japanese airfields at Hollandia and Aitape become operational for Allied aircraft.

The HMCS Athabaskan was sunk in the English Channel by the T24, once again showing active Kriegsmarine activity in the Channel.  The T24 picked up 83 men as prisoners, 44 were rescued by the Allies, and 123 went down with the ship.

The I-183 was sunk off the Bungo Strait by the USS Pogy.

The U-421 was sunk at Toulon in an American air raid.

Stars and Stripes, April 29, 1944.

While I can't post it due to an active copyright, The Saturday Evening Post came out with a classic illustration called "Arm Chair General" by Norman Rockwell.

Last prior edition:

Friday, April 28, 1944. Day Two of Execise Tiger.

1930s, 1936 Election, 1940s, 1942, 1944, 1950, 1950s, boats and ships, Capitalism, Dieppe Raid, Disaster, Exercise Tiger, Franklin Roosevelt, German Kriegsmarine, Korean War, Personalities, U.S. Navy, World War Two

Blog Mirror: Norman Rockwell and his Dam Painting

 

Norman Rockwell and his Dam Painting

Saturday, November 27, 1923. Cairo Declaration, Australian advances, Poignant art.

It was a Saturday, and all the Saturday magazines were out. As we're dealing with 1943, they're still protected by copyright.  They all featured Thanksgiving themes, but the most recalled is that of the Saturday Evening Post, which featured a Rockwell with a picture of an Italian girl praying near rubble, wearing the wool mackinaw of an American Army 1st Sergeant.

The US, China, and UK agreed to the release of the Cairo Declaration.  It stated:

The several military missions have agreed upon future military operations against Japan. The Three Great Allies expressed their resolve to bring unrelenting pressure against their brutal enemies by sea, land, and air. This pressure is already rising.

The Three Great Allies are fighting this war to restrain and punish the aggression of Japan. They covet no gain for themselves and have no thought of territorial expansion. It is their purpose that Japan shall be stripped of all the islands in the Pacific which she has seized or occupied since the beginning of the first World War in 1914, and that all the territories Japan has stolen from the Chinese, such as Manchuria, Formosa, and The Pescadores, shall be restored to the Republic of China. Japan will also be expelled from all other territories which she has taken by violence and greed. The aforesaid three great powers, mindful of the enslavement of the people of Korea, are determined that in due course Korea shall become free and independent.

With these objects in view the three Allies, in harmony with those of the United Nations at war with Japan, will continue to persevere in the serious and prolonged operations necessary to procure the unconditional surrender of Japan.

Included in the "rising pressure" that declaration referenced were actions on New Guinea, where on this day the Australians, who didn't get a seat at the table in the Cairo Conference, began an armored supported advance at Wareo.

The Australian Army was using the Matilda tank, which had been a disappointment elsewhere, to great effect in New Guinea.  Its use took the Japanese by surprise.

The campaign in New Guinea, one of the major ones of the war against Japan, which was heavily borne by the Australian Army, went on until the Japanese surrender.  It was like the Marine action at Bougainville, albeit on a much larger scale, that way.

The Army-Navy Game was played at West Point.  Navy beat Army 13 to 0.

Angelo Bertelli was awarded the Heisman Trophy for his performance as Notre Dame's quarterback.  He was in Marine Corps bootcamp at the time.

Photo of eleven collegic football players, including Bertelli, who had joined the Marine Corps.

Badly wounded as a Marine Corps officer on Iwo Jima, his football career in the NFL was short after the war, ending in 1948.  His Marine Corps career lasted longer, as he remained in the reserves until 1957.  He died of brain cancer at age 78 in 1999.

As playing for Notre Dame would indicate at the time, Bertelli was Catholic and the child of Italian immigrants.

Thursday, November 22, 1923.

Saturday, November 10, 1923. The loyal dog Hachikō (ハチ公).

Hachikō (ハチ公) an Akita, was born. The dog would return daily to wait for his deceased owner to return from work for over nine years, living to be eleven years old.

The Saturday magazines were on the stand.

Former President Woodrow Wilson condemned the U.S. isolationist policy as "cowardly and dishonorable" in a radio address.

Crown Prince Wilhelm of German returned to Germany from the Netherlands.

Ludendorff was released on parole, demonstrating one of the problems Weimar Germany had with suppressing anti-democratic uprisings. . . the tendency to let those on the right, go.

Saturday, June 26, 1943. Mutiny in Norway, Choosing Normandy, and Willie Gillis.

Today in World War II History—June 26, 1943: Allied commanders choose Normandy for invasion of France in 1944 and appoint Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory to prepare air plans for D-day.

Sarah Sundin, on her blog.

The crews of six U-boats based in Norway mutinied, refusing to put out to sea in light of high German submarine losses.  They were arrested and placed in Akershus Prison in Oslo.  The collapse of Imperial Germany began, of course, with sailor revolts in 1918.

Fritz Schmidt, age 39, the German Commissioner-General for Political Affairs and Propaganda in the occupied Netherlands died when he "fell, jumped, or was pushed out of a train".

"USS Newell (DE-322), launches sideways at Houston, Texas, June 26, 1943. The ship was named in honor of Naval Aviator Lieutenant Commander Byron Bruce Newell who was killed while serving onboard USS Hornet (CV-8) during the Battle of Santa Cruz Islands, October 26, 1942. Ship’s Sponsor was the widow. Photographed August 12, 1943. Official U.S. Navy photograph."

A famous Norman Rockwell illustration appeared on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post, depicting his everyman soldier figure, Willie Gillis,  showing the "cat's cradle" string trick to an Indian snake charmer.

Saturday, May 29, 1943. The "real" Rosie the Riveter

The Saturday Evening Post ran Norman Rockwell's illustration of Rosie the Riveter.

I wrote about this earlier here, although I did not post the iconic image as it's copyrighted:\

Sarah Sundin's blog has a number of interesting items in it:

J. Howard Miller's little seen "We Can Do It" poster.  Note the "Post Feb. 15 to Feb 28" notation on the poster.

Today in World War II History—February 15, 1943: J. Howard Miller’s “We Can Do It” poster, now identified with Rosie the Riveter, is first posted at Westinghouse for a two-week in-house campaign.

The poster is one of the most recognizable in history now.  Ironically, it was little known to the World War Two generation itself, and only became widely known some forty years later.  In this sense, it's much like the "Keep Calm And Carry On" British poster, which was so rare in World War Two that it's debated if it was put up at all.

The poster, which is in fact not particularly skillfully executed, was limited to 1,800 runs and 17" x 22" in side.  In its original posting, it was put up only in Westinghouse factories, and in fact the female subject in the image wears a Westinghouse Electric floor employee badge. The workers who would have seen it were engaged in making helmet liners, and the poster was part of a gentle effort, in part, from dissuading strikes.  It was part of a 42 poster series by Miller.

Miller himself may be regarded as a somewhat obscure illustrator.  He was busy during World War Two and issued other posters that had an industrial theme.

Miller's female worker was based on a photograph of Geraldine Doyle, nee Hoff or Naomi Parker, it isn't really clear which, although some claim that it's definitely Parker.  It might have been both women, and more than just the two. The poster was painted from a photograph or photographs, and not a live model.

During the war itself, the Rockwell Saturday Evening Post illustration of a stout, defiant female riveter was the accepted depiction of Rosie the Riveter.  Rockwell, with his keen eye for detail, had painted "Rosie" on her lunch box.  

The name, Rosie the Riveter, was first used in a song by that name by Redd Evans and John Jacob Loeb, recorded by The Four Vagabonds, which came out prior to Rockwell's May 1943, illustration.  The song, in turn, had been inspired by a newspaper column about 19-year-old Rosalind P. Walter who had gone to work as a riveter in Stratford Connecticut as part of the war effort. The model for the Rockwell painting was not an industrial worker, but a telephone operator, Mary Doyle Keefe, née, perhaps ironically, Doyle, who was Rockwell's neighbor.  She actually posed for a photograph for Rockwell's photographer, rather than for Rockwell live.

Keefe, who was not yet married, didn't like the painting as Rockwell had made her image so beefy, for which he apologized.  She attended Temple University, became a dental hygienist, married and passed away in 2015 at age 92.  Rosalind P. Walter went on in later life to become quite wealthy and was a noted philanthropist, particularly supporting public television.  She died in 2020 at age 95.

J. Howard Miller lived until 2004, but remained obscure, unlike his famous poster.

It should be noted that the depiction of the women and their story itself is interesting.  Vermonter Keefe was the daughter of a logger, but was obviously from a solid middle class Catholic family, something that would not have been surprising in any fashion at the time. As noted, she was not an industrial worker herself.  Geraldine Doyle worked only very briefly as an industrial worker in 1942, quitting as she feared injuring her hands as she was a cellist.  She later married a dentist later in 1943.  They met in a bookstore.  While her association with the painting is disputed, her World War Two factory photograph is remarkably similar to the poster.  Parker was employed in a factory prior to the war and continued to be during it.

The Miller image is used for a sign on the outside of the Rosie the Riveter WWII Home Front National Historical Park in California, a Federal park dedicated to the World War Two home front.  World War Two, immediately following the Great Depression, had an enormous and permeant (and probably not good, really) impact on California, so the location is well placed.

The Rockwell image is, in my view, so much better than the poster variant that's come to be lionized it isn't even funny.  I'm not saying the Miller version is bad, but it doesn't compare to the Rockwell illustration that appeared the day before Memorial Day, 1943. 

Note also that the Saturday Evening Post went with something bold and defiant, and actually female, rather than the endless maudlin posts you'll see this Memorial Day.  Indeed, offhand, I can't find any of the national media that sought to inspire guilt, as current recollection so often do.

Saturday, April 28, 1923. Measuring

The Saturday magazines were out.

The SS Deutschland was launched. The passenger ship of the Hamburg American line would go into Kreigsmarine service in 1940 as an accommodation ship.  In 1945 she was converted to a hospital ship but insufficient paint existed in order to paint her entirely white.  She was sunk in May 1945.

Wembley Stadium hosted its first event.

McGreen & Harris, 4/28/23

Williams ran a wordless classic.

Monday, April 12, 1943. They also serve. . . an accidental tragedy.

U.S. Army Lt. Robert Toner, the co-pilot of Lady Be Good, wrote his last journal entry, "No help yet, very cold nite".

Toner was a native of North Attleboro, Massachusetts, where he was the son of the police chief.  In contrast to football star Tom Harmon, who we noted in our entry yesterday, Toner wanted int, having first jointed the Royal Canadian Air Force.  He completed his flight training with the U.S. Army after the US entered the war.

The British War Office issued its first report on Germany's missile program.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer announced that the war had cost the United Kingdom £13 billion to date and was costing £15 million per day.

Martin Bormann was appointed as Secretary to Adolf Hitler, the second-highest office in Nazi Germany.

Bormann would not outlive the Third Reich.  He attempted to escape encircled Berlin but was unable to, and committed suicide like many high ranking Nazis.  Perhaps uniquely, however, he was sentenced to death, after his death, as his body was not identified until 1998.

Bormann had seen German military service late in World War One, but he never saw action.  He was an early member of the Nazi Party, having joined in 1927.

Sarah Sundin reports:

Today in World War II History—April 12, 1943: US Second War Loan Drive begins, centered around Norman Rockwell’s Four Freedoms posters. Hitler appoints influential Martin Bormann as Secretary to the Führer.