The Sinking of the Liscome Bay
(Yank Magazine, 1944)
A World War Two article from YANK MAGAZINE recalling the sinking of a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier off the coast of the Gilbert Islands –
1947, The U.S. Department of the Navy, War at SeaThe U.S. Navy’s War: Pearl Harbor to Midway
The U.S. Navy’s War: Pearl Harbor to Midway
(Dept. of the Navy, 1947)
An essay on the U.S. Navy’s progress during the first six months of World War Two.
Japan’s decision to launch a war was based on the assumption that the conflict in Europe would render Russia and Great Britain negligible factors in the Far East. It was based on the further assumption that the United States, already committed to near belligerency in the Atlantic could not, even if finally successful in that theater, mount an offensive in the Pacific in less than 18 months to two years and would not in any case be willing to pay the price of total victory in the Pacific.
The Battle of the Coral Sea
(Newsweek & Yank Magazines, 1942 – 3)
From the 4th through the 8th of May, 1942, the Japanese and American fleets exchanged blows in their first major engagement. The Americans won, but not by much; the most important battle would take place four weeks later at Midway. But the Yanks were happy with the way it turned out nonetheless:
It was a victory all right – but it was not as decisive as it sounded, to a jubilant America. For in the north in the mandated islands the main Japanese Fleet still stood ready for action at any moment – a fleet as yet largely unscathed, a fleet that has always come back for more, a fleet that does not like the taste of defeat.
Read about the Battle of Leyte Gulf…
The Battle of Midway
(Yank Magazine, 1943)
Written months after the battle, this is the Yank report on the naval engagement that was the turning point in the war:
The Jap had failed to get a foothold on Australia. Strategists reasoned that he would now strike east, at an outpost of the North American continent. Alaska became the No. 1 alert; bombers were flown to Midway; carriers came north and Admiral Nimitz pushed patrols far out toward the Bonins and Wake islands… A navy patrol found the enemy first, in the early hours of June 3 [1942]… Reconnaissance showed a Jap force of about 80 ships approaching Midway.
– the contest that followed proved to be the first truly decisive battle in the Pacific war.
Click here to read more about Midway.
An Interview with U.S. Admiral Chester Nimitz
(Yank Magazine, 1944)
Yank correspondent H.N. Oliphant interviewed Admiral Chester William Nimitz (1885 – 1966) for the August 4, 1944 issue regarding the progress in the Pacific Theater of Operations. At that time, the battle of the Marianas was being waged and it was a subject of much concern as to it’s significance.
In the Central Pacific, we have in three swift leaps advanced our sea power thousands of miles to the west of Pearl Harbor. Now our western-most bastions face the Philippines and undoubtedly worry the man on the street in Tokyo concerning the immediate safety of his own skin.
Click here to read about Admiral Mischer…
Click here to read a unique story about the Battle of the Sula Straits…
Halsey at Leyte Gulf
(Pageant Magazine, 1960)
The Battle of Leyte Gulf (October 23 – 26, 1944) was the largest naval battle in World War II – as well as the most decisive. Given the naval weaponry that exists in the digital age, it is highly unlikely that opposing navies will ever again have need to come within visible range of one another again. This article tells the history of that battle, shedding light on a few of the important naval campaigns that came before. Written sixteen years after the events by a knowledgeable author, you will gain an understanding of the thoughts that were going through Admiral Halsey’s cranium when he commanded the largest battle fleet ever assembled.
The Greatest Sea Battle
(Collier’s Magazine, 1945)
Patching together the reports of four different war correspondents, the editors at Collier’s were able to create a genuine page-turner narrating the American naval victory that took place off the coast of the Philippines during the Fall of 1944.
Secretary of the Navy Forrestal summed up the results as ‘One of the great naval victories of the war that will go down, along with Midway and Guadalcanal sea battles as one of the great, shattering blows struck against Japanese sea power. The Japanese fleet was indeed beaten, routed and broken.’
‘We Can Win On Both Oceans”
(The American Magazine, 1942)
Frank Knox was FDR’s Secretary of the Navy between 1940 through 1944. Arm and arm with his lieutenant, Under Secretary James Forrestal, the two men made good on the Two-Ocean Navy Bill passed by Congress during the summer of 1940:
I am proud of this Navy of ours. Every American has a right to be proud of it, to know that it is, up to now, the greatest navy in history. But we cannot afford to be complacent about it. It is still not the navy that our country needs and that our fighting men in the ships deserve.
The Necessity of Overthrowing Russia
(Pathfinder Magazine, 1950)
This is a profile of the American Cold Warrior James Burnham (1905 – 1987), who is remembered as being one of the co-founders of the conservative monthly, National Review
The Navy Tells It
(PM Tabloid, 1942)
One year after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor the Navy released its report to the press with updates on all the various repairs that were put into effect.
A Busy Year for the FBI
(PM Tabloid, 1942)
The FBI had been tangling Axis spies throughout the mid-to-late Thirties, but with the December 8, 1941, declaration of war the FBI was emboldened with far greater powers. This explains why Director Hoover exclaimed that his agency had just completed the busiest year in its history.
Norman Thomas, Socialist Candidate For President
(The American Magazine, 1940)
Here is a profile of the American leftist Norman Thomas (1884 – 1968), who sought the U.S. presidency six (6) times on the Socialist ticket. He was a former clergyman and despite the fact that he wished to ban all private property, nationalize all businesses and put the kibosh on a free press – he still sounded like swell Joe to us.
The Communist on Capitol Hill
(Newsweek Magazine, 1945)
Although his membership in the Communist Party would not be known until he had already been out of the House of Representatives for six years, Hugh De Lacy (1910 – 1986) was easily recognized by his colleagues as quite the radical…
No doubt De Lacy’s favorite presidential candidate was the American socialist Norman Thomas – and you can read about him here…
The German Resistance
(Coronet Magazine, 1941)
The Free German Movement is vigorously gnawing away at the very roots of Naziism with teeth filed to needle sharpness. Our organizations are fighting Hitler, at home or in South America with his own weapons. We have consolidated earlier gains against Hitler with important new gains.
So wrote Dr. Otto Strasser (1897 – 1974) who oversaw the Free German Movement, the Black Front and other Nazi resistance organizations. He must have been pretty effective, the Nazis put a half-million dollar price on his head.
Black Nazis?
(Ken Magazine, 1939)
Black Nazis: Fritz Delfs, leader of the Nazis in Tanganyika, the former German East Africa that Hitler is demanding, soft-pedals Aryan supremacy credo in propounding Nazi ideology, and capitalizes traditional use of the swastika by the natives as a symbol of fertility.
Click here to read about the fall of Paris…
Collier’s
(Scribner’s Magazine, 1938)
From Scribner’s on-going series from 1938, Magazines That Sell came this brief history of the crowd-pleasing weekly, Collier’s (1888 – 1957).
‘Class Magazines”
(Scribner’s Magazine, 1938)
This article looks at the rise of Vanity Fair, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and House & Garden – recognizing them as highly unique publications for their time. Special attention is paid to publisher Condé Nast and his meteoric rise during the early 20th Century.
The class magazines exude an aura of wealth and their circulations, therefore, are limited. They cater to the fit though few and they do this with slick paper, excellent illustrations and a sycophantic reverence for Society – at thirty-five to fifty cents a copy.
Click here to read about Fortune Magazine…
The Black Dress Arrives
(The New Republic, 1921)
The attached article is by an unidentified, pointy-headed male, and regardless of the fact that it was written over 100 years ago, many of his reflections regarding fashion and those who are enslaved by it are still relevant in our own time. It all started for this fellow when he felt the urge to understand why such a broad variety of New York women should take to wearing black for each and every occasion and so he polished-up the ol’ cranium, rolled up his sleeves and began to think hard about the nature of fashion. He concluded that the lot of the female fashion victim
is not the ordinary story of women’s victimization, her subjection in a man-made world. She, after all, accepts of herself this silent decree of fashion and rushes to it. It is woman-made, this particular enslavement