I like writing holiday-themed humor. But none is harder than Memorial Day.
So, I was happy when I found this old comic book cover art. Even in 1943, it was a sweetly naive, childish view of war. But sometimes reality is a little too real to bear.
Happy Memorial Day!
Art by Al Plastino from 4Most Vol. 2, #4, Fall 1943.
Transcript:
Two boys firing a sling shot and throwing a stone at pumpkins made up to look like Adolph Hitler, Benito Mussolini and Emperor Michinomiya Hirohito.
Caption: If only it was this easy! Memorial Day
4MostV2#4Fall1943_Al_Plastino_NoveltyPress
Art by Al Plastino from 4Most Vol. 2, #4, Fall 1943.
↓ Transcript
Caption: If only it was this easy! Memorial Day
4MostV2#4Fall1943_Al_Plastino_NoveltyPress
Art by Al Plastino from 4Most Vol. 2, #4, Fall 1943.
4MostV2#4Fall1943_Al_Plastino_NoveltyPress
Art by Al Plastino from 4Most Vol. 2, #4, Fall 1943.
Oh, don’t get your knickerbockers in a twist…
Happy Memorial Day
Thanks (belatedly), Jam. I hope you had a good Memorial Day too!
I’ll say it’s better look than the exposed underwear and/or exposed buttcrack of a few years ago but those fashion choices wouldn’t bring the young girls flocking today.
Want a great WWII movie? Watch Brad Pitt’s “Fury”. It’s moved ahead of “The Dirty Dozen” on my war movie list.
Or, if you want traditional memorial day, visit an older small town cemetery in rural America as I did last Friday. Look for the older headstones with notations – if they’re still discernible: “12th Minnesota” “21st Iowa” “Wounded at Chickamauga”.
Or, on a different note look for whole families wiped out 1918 to 1920 during the influenza pandemic.
Sorry about this rant. Memorial Day brings this stuff out in me. My Grandfather WWI – Europe. Dad WWII – Europe. And yes, I served – it’s what we did. 1st Marine Aircraft Wing. Chu Lai. More at risk from race riots than from the occasional rocket/mortar attack – I was there post Tet. Now an international airport – nice to think the runways are still in use. Sort of…
WWII. So much was written. Latch onto a copy of Ernie Pyle’s “Brave Men” and read about how numb you get when exposed to thousands of violently killed, grotesquely deformed dead bodies. Read about Ernie’s view of the professional soldier in WWII – the former civilian turned dispassionate killer of the enemy – doing so to bring the war to a quicker conclusion.
So much was photographed – obtain a copy of Life Magazine’s “Picture History of WWII”.
For a quick read with cartoons read about Willie and Joe in Bill Maudlin’s “Up Front” mostly focused on the Italian Campaign.
I grew up in the 50’s/60’s. Read about Navajo Code Talkers. Read about U.S. citizens of Japanese descent put in internment Camps. Read all about the rescue of the “Lost Battalion” by Nisei troops of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. So much more. People on little Islands spotting Japanese planes and ships. Iron Bottom Sound. The sinking of the Bismark – and the destruction of it’s sister shop the Tirpitz. U Boats. North Atlantic convoys. The French Resistance. German WWI cruisers used as, essentially, pirate ships. A well documented war.
But what really sticks with me about WWII was the idea that “Duty Called”. The children of the rich served because of a sense of DUTY. You couldn’t be elected dogcatcher if you hadn’t served in WWII. Little by little that’s vanished in today’s America. Despite the rah rah efforts of the well funded Defense Industry and Pentagon PR campaigns a large segment of Americans are (if they think about it at all) indifferent if not disdainful of the “all volunteer” military.
They blame the wrong people. We kill directly (or indirectly see how much “foreign aid” is done in what is essentially gift certificates for military equipment) third world, poverty plagued brown/black people, who speak obscure languages, that are no threat to the United States, on the orders of the policy makers bought and paid for by the Military Industrial complex.
Thank you for all the commentary and the list of WWII resources, Dave. I’m familiar with some of the material (particularly Bill Maudlin’s Willie and Joe which I have in a slip-covered, two volume set.) But certainly not all. I will definitely add “Fury” to my watch list. I missed it when it came out.
Well said! I have never heard of so many politicians taking pride in not serving.
I haven’t noticed politicians bragging about this. But it’s certainly true that—unlike the past—very few politicians have served. Of course, the same can be said about most non-politicians too in this all-voluntary-serve military era.
What I have noticed is that some of the most hawkish politicians and government-types are the ones who want to go to war the most!