Here is a short article that appeared a year and a half into the administration of President Roosevelt and it lays the nation’s economic short comings right upon the doorstep of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The writer articulated how unrecognizable the nation had become in such a very short span of time. The president’s anti-competition policies were wreaking havoc on an already damaged economy.
For the first time in history, the U.S. government is training professional spies – and picking the brightest college youngsters to make espionage their career. By December, some 250 men and 50 women will be learning the spy business from the bottom up, at schools they mustn’t even admit exist.
A 1951 article about the young CIA can be read by clicking here…
– from Amazon:
Captured in the fall of Singapore, 66 soldiers of the 5/11 Sikh Regiment of the Indian Army were freed by our troops. Used as slave laborers since their capture in February 1942, the Indians were building jetties on Los Negros Island when they were rescued.
Asked how they were treated by the Japanese, the Sikhs shake their heads sadly, smile and say, ‘Not very well.’
This account of life aboard a U.S. train carrying Nazi prisoners of war to prison camps is an authentic bit of after-the battle reporting by an army MP who was a civilian artist. That his eye missed no telling detail is evident from both his first-person story and his on-the-spot pencil sketches.
The Nazis are extremely curious about America, they gaze out of the windows constantly…War plants along our routes are the real eye-openers to the Nazis; those factories blazing away as we travel across America day after day. At first the prisoners look with mere interest and curiosity, then they stare unbelievingly, and before we reach the camps they just sit dumbfounded at the train windows.
Click here to read about Hitler’s slanderous comment regarding the glutinous Hermann Goering.
A printable account from a YANK correspondent assigned to General Patton’s Third Army as it swept through Germany and liberated the wounded Air Corps personnel who had been kept at a German military hospital during their recuperation.
Statistical data concerning the U.S. Army casualties in June and July of 1944 can be read in this article.
The article posted above pointed out that the American-held German P.O.W.s who participated in the U.S. Army’s Special Projects Division were all volunteers and willing participants in the program. These Germans had shown some enthusiasm and an interest to learn about democracy and little coaxing was needed. Contrast this with the column linked to the title above that illustrated the crude manner in which the unforgiving Soviet Army chose to propagandize the malnourished German P.O.W.s who fought at Stalingrad:
If communism provides the Utopia that Marx, Lenin and Stalin claim, why does Russia have to rule by the bayonet?
As many of you know, the U.S.S.R. did not release most of their German P.O.W.s until the death of Stalin in 1953.
Within the moldy, dank confines an abandoned brewery located within the walls of Metz, a troupe of exhausted GIs stumbled upon a German general who was earnestly hoping to avoid capture.
He turned out to be Major General Anton Dunckern, police president of Metz and Gestapo commander for Alsace-Lorraine. He’s the first big Gestapo man we’ve taken; he ranks close to Himmler and is one of the prize catches of the war.
Comprising the latest improvements for overseas -The Trench Coat ‘De Luxe’!
The raglan sleeve, gaberdine trench coat made by Tunmer was yet another of the many choices made available to the officers of the Entent Cordiale.
Yet another action-posed advertisement for an officer’s private purchase trench coat. The Great Military Outfitter, John Barker and Company, stepped up to the plate during the crises of 1914 and began to produce the famous ‘Kenbar’ trench coat:
Every detail so necessary for the most strenuous wear in the trenches is embodied in this excellent coat. The collar can be worn in four positions. The sleeves are made with reinforced elbows, and the skirt is cut full and fitted with cavalry gusset.
Similar to the coat worn by English officers. Cut very full presenting an unusual swagger effect. Made of double texture, tan cashmere with twill lining. An extra, detachable, fleece interlining affords further protection against the cold… Full belt with slide buckle, and belt rings to which accessories may be attached. Absolutely waterproof. 48 inches in length.
This tiny notice reported that the G.I. Bill of Rights was passed Congress, was now enacted into law. A list of all the original (1944) veteran’s benefits are listed for a quick read.The readers of YANK were the intended beneficiaries of this legislation and it seems terribly ironic that this news item was granted such a minute space in the magazine.
No matter how you slice it, few acts of Congress have left such a beneficial mark across the American landscape as this one.
This 1936 magazine article reported that Germany had spent a considerable sum on munitions and armaments throughout much of the previous year and was not likely to stop anytime soon. In light of this fact, the French and British governments were moved to do the same:
Winston Churchill, a cherubic reddish-haired Cassandra, bobbed up in the House of Commons again last week to warn his countrymen of the ‘remorseless hammers’ of the world.
Until recently we always seemed to think that all those pretty British girls during the war were genuinely captivated by that unique and sincere breed of American male called the G.I.. It seemed obvious to us that such a self-effacing, homespun, mud-between-the-toes kind of charm would naturally lead to thousands upon thousands of out-of-wedlock births and prove once and for all that the Anglo-American alliance was truly a necessary union and not merely a wartime contrivance. But after a careful reading of the attached headline from this 1943 Yank, it occurred to us that perhaps British girls were just doing their bit for king and country.
One British woman complained that the average American GI of World War II was substandard in the bedroom; to read the article, click here.
This is excerpt from a longer article about the goings-on in 1914 presented an interesting (if incomplete) list of Hollywood’s offerings for 1914:
• The most popular screen performers were Mary Pickford, John Bunny, Ethel Barrymore and May Irwin.
• The most popular films were The Peril’s of Pauline and an Italian film titled Cabiria (directed by Giovanni Pastrone, aka: Piero Fosco).
This reminiscence pays tribute to a stand-up comedian named Jack Gardner and his skit, Curse You Jack Dalton, in which he interacted with the performers on a movie screen, ordering them about, cracking wise and even having the audience believe that he had shot one of them.
…you think it’s easy for a guy my age not to be in the Army? You think I’m having a good time? Every place I go people spit on me…
So spake one of the 4-F men interviewed for this magazine article when asked what it was like to be a twenty-year-old excused from military service during World War Two. This article makes clear the resentment experienced at the deepest levels by all other manner of men forced to soldier-on in uniform; and so Yank had one of their writers stand on a street corner to ask the slackers what it was like to wear civies during wartime.
Read about the 4-F guy who creamed three obnoxious GIs.
Click here to read an article about a World War Two draft board.
This snippet is about a major crisis (and a colossal media event) that took place in the life of Queen Elizabeth’s sister, Princess Margaret Rose (1930 – 2002) – when she was told in 1955 that the man she loved, Captain Peter Townsend, was not suitable for marriage.
More on Post-War Germany can be read here…Read more …
