1945 – Page 9 – Old Magazine Articles

An Eye-Full of Post-War Tokyo

An eyewitness account of the devastation delivered to Tokyo as reported by the first Americans to enter that city following the Japanese surrender some weeks earlier:

The people of Tokyo are taking the arrival of the first few Americans with impeccable Japanese calm. Sometimes they turn and look at us twice, but they have shown no emotion toward us except a mild curiosity and occasional amusement…They are still proud and a little bit superior. They know they lost the war, but they are not apologizing for it.

Click here to read about the humbled Japan.

Bill Mauldin Of The Stars & Stripes
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

No other cartoonist during the Second World War ever portrayed the American GI so knowingly and with more sympathy than the Stars & Stripes cartoonist Sgt. Bill Mauldin (1921 – 2003), who was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartoons in 1945.

Mauldin wrote the attached essay at the end of the war and gave the Yank Magazine readers an earful regarding his understanding of the front, the rear and all the the blessed officers in between

Click here to read a wartime interview with another popular 1940s American cartoonist: Milton Caniff.

He Died Badly
(Newsweek Magazine, 1945)

An Italian partisan fighter described to an American correspondent exactly how Benito Mussolini met his end.

The U.S. Army’s Cannabis Study
(Newesweek Magazine, 1945)

Posted herein is a report on the seven-month study on the effects marijuana has on military personnel that was conducted in 1944:

A great many of [the participants] attempted to form a compensatory image of themselves as superior people. ‘I could be a general like MacArthur. He looks smooth – like he’s high all the time.’

Kicking God Out of the Schools
(Newsweek Magazine & PM Tabloid, 1945)

A religion-in-the-schools trial, held last week in the Champaign, Illinois Circuit Court, will probably make history. The plaintiff was Mrs. Vashti McCollum, 32, pert, wide-eyed wife of a University of Illinois professor, demanding that the Champaign School Board discontinue a five-year program of religious instruction in school buildings, on the ground that the constitutional separation of church and state is jeopardized.

Posted herein was one of the first of many articles concerning what would come to known as the landmark Supreme Court case McCollum v. Board of Education (1948): the court decided in her favor.

Click here to read about Darwin in the schools.

The King Tiger Tank
(U.S. Dept. of War, 1945)

This article is illustrated with a photograph of the King Tiger tank and accompanied by some vital statistics and assorted observations that were documented by the U.S. Department of War and printed in one of their manuals in March of 1945:

The king Tiger is a tank designed essentially for defensive warfare or for breaking through strong lines of defense. It is unsuitable for rapid maneuver and highly mobile warfare because of its great weight and and low speed…The King Tiger virtually is invulnerable to frontal attack, but the flanks, which are less well protected, can be penetrated by Allied antitank weapons at most normal combat ranges.

The American answer to the Tiger was the M26 Pershing Tank; read about it here.

If you wish to read about the only German tank of World War I, click here.

The Ex-Soldier-Goes Shopping
(Collier’s Magazine, 1945)

In light of the fact that all Army personnel would be issued $300 with their honorable discharge papers, the fashion editor for Esquire Magazine, Henry Jackson, decided to moonlight at Collier’s in order to provide some solid fashion-tips on how best to spend that hard-earned cash.

‘Occupied England”
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

This Yank Magazine article, written just after the Channel Islands liberation, tells some of the stories of the Nazi occupation of Jersey and Guernsey Islands.

Before the war the English Channel Islands – long known as a vacation spot for the wealthy – were wonderful places to ‘get away from it all.’

Then the Germans came to the islands after Dunkirk, and for five years 100,000 subjects of his majesty the King were governed by 30,000 Nazi officers and their men.

An American Corpse at Ohrdruf Concentration Camp
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

From time to time, it was the practice of the German military to separate American Jewish soldiers from their fellows and transfer them to concentration camps. The corpse of one of these men was found at the Nazi concentration camp in Ohrdruf, Germany.

Click here to read about the malnourishment and starvation of Allied prisoners of war…

The Birth of Airline Food
(Coronet Magazine, 1945)

Newton Wilson, a modest, quiet, somewhat academic man who never leaps before he looks through, in and around a situation, became the 20th Century innovator of precise recipes; a sort of Fanny Farmer of flying.

Click here to read about the earliest airline stewardesses…

Home Front Teen Slang
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

A 1945 Yank Magazine article concerning American teen culture on the W.W. II home front in which the journalist/anthropologist paid particular attention to the teen-age slang of the day.

Some of today’s teenagers —pleasantly not many — talk the strange new language of sling swing. In this bright lexicon of the good citizens of tomorrow, a girl with sex appeal is an able Grable or a ready Hedy. A pretty girl is whistle bait. A boy whose mug and muscles appeal to the girls is a mellow man, a hunk of heart break or a glad lad.

To read about one of the fashion legacies of W.W. II, click here…

Click here to learn how the Beatniks spoke.
Click here if you would like to read a glossary of WAC slang terms.

•Suggested Reading• Flappers 2 Rappers: American Youth Slang

Admiral Mitscher, U.S.N.
(Coronet Magazine, 1945)

Admiral Pete Mitscher was one of the primary architects of American naval aviation during the 20th Century.In this column, one of the officers who served under him during the admiral’s command of carrier Task Force 58 recalls why he came to admire the man as deeply as he did.
One of Admiral Pete Mitscher’s officers recalls the man with tremendous admiration:

They used to think a carrier was a hit-and-run fighter, but Pete changed that. He said, ‘Hit’em and stay. Hit’em again tomorrow. And he did.’

Click here to read about Admiral Nimitz…

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.’

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 End of the Road for Ernie Pyle
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

This article was penned by Yank correspondent Evans Wylie; it is an account of Ernie Pyle’s (1900 – 1945) surprise appearance during the Okinawa campaign and the violent death that Pyle had long anticipated for himself. His end came while he was being driven along a road in the company of Marines in a sector that was believed to have been safe.
Of all the many American war correspondents writing during World War II, Pyle was, without a doubt, the most well loved; he was adored by readers on the home front as well as the GIs in the field. Like many men, Pyle struggled in his career as a younger man; yet when the war broke out he very quickly found his voice – and his readership soon followed.

Two months after the death of Ernie Pyle, United Artists released a movie about him; Click here to read about it…

Tin Cans Go to War
(Click Magazine, 1945)

This article is accompanied by nineteen pictures illustrating the various ways tin cans are put to use by the American military during W.W.II, and it was printed to show the necessity of full civilian participation along the home front. In order to guarantee that this message would get out to everyone, magazine editors would have been provided with these photographs and an assortment of facts by a government agency called the Office of War Information.

The Comic Book Industry: Tweleve Years Old in 1945
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

This is an article about the 1940s comic book industry and the roll it played during W.W. II.

The writer doesn’t spell it out for us, but by-and-by it dawned on us that among all the various firsts the World War Two generation had claim to, they were also the first generation to read comic books. Although this article concentrates on the wartime exploits of such forties comic book characters as Plastic Man and Blackhawk, it should be remembered that the primary American comic book heroes that we remember today were no slackers during the course of the war; Superman smashed the Siegfried Line prior to arresting Hitler as he luxuriated in his mountain retreat; Batman selflessly labored in the fields of counterintelligence while Captain America signed-up as a buck private.

Click here to read an article about the predecessor to the American comic book: the Dime Novel.

If you would like to read a W.W. II story concerning 1940s comic strips and the failed plot to assassinate General Eisenhower, click here.

World War II Fabric Rationing in the United States
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

This illustrated article appeared in Yank Magazine during March of 1945 and explained fully what fabric rationing was and how the American home front fashion consumer was affected:

The absence of cuffs and vests aside, pre-war styles in men’s clothing are still obtainable. A man can get plaids, stripes, herringbones and all sorts of weaves in brown, blue, gray and all the various pastel shades. …Women generally have had to make great changes in their dressing habits. In the first place the shortage of rubber has raised hell with the girdle, or foundation garment..

Click here to read more about fashion on the W.W. II home front…

Read a 1940s fashion article about fabric restrictions and the War Production Board.