Recent Articles – Page 115 – Old Magazine Articles

The Industrial Visions of Paul R. Meltsner
(Art Digest, 1936)

The artist Paul R. Meltsner (1905 – 1966) was one of many WPA artists given to depicting sweaty, mal-nourished proletarians laboring in the fore-ground of smoke-plagued, industrial cityscapes and his work can be found today in the vaults of every major American museum. This is a 1936 art review covering his one-man show at the Midtown Galleries in New York:

Meltsner builds his pictures everyday scenes of industrial life, dedicating them to labor and the machine…He gets broad vitality in his forms and force in his compositions, relieving at the same time the usual drabness of such scenes by a tonic of color.

Another 1936 article about Paul Meltsner can be read here.

Lincoln Kirstein and George Balanchine
(Delineator Magazine, 1935)

Attached is one of the first articles to be written about balletomanes Lincoln Kirstein (1907 – 1996) and his efforts with George Balanchine (1904 – 1983) and philanthropist Edward M.M. Warburg (1910 – 1992) to form the first American ballet company (the corps was later called the New York City Ballet).

Finding the Graves of American Aviators
(Literary Digest, 1919)

The difficult task of wandering the war-torn countryside of Europe in search of fallen World War I American pilots fell to a U.S. Army captain named E.W. Zinn. A combat pilot himself, Zinn had roamed France, Belgium and Germany interviewing the local population to see what they knew of American crash sites:

Many times he has come upon a grave with a rude cross on which was scrawled:

‘Unidentified American Aviator’ or ‘Two Unidentified American Aviators’

Captain Zinn has found that in a great many cases American fliers were buried either by the Germans or by civilians with no mark of identification left on them.

Click here to read some statistical data about the American Doughboys of the First World War.

The Nazis Hated These Guys
(Yank Magazine, 1944)

The attached W.W. II magazine article tells the story of the hard-charging Goums – a detachment of French-Moroccan infantry who appeared to the American GIs as genuine curios (Wikipedia definition: Goumier is a term used for Moroccan soldiers, who served in auxiliary units attached to the French Army, between 1908 and 1956).

The Germans definitely don’t like the Goums. As for the Italians, they’re scared to death of them. In the Mateur and Bizerte sectors, where the Goums were attached to the Ninth Division, three Italian companies surrendered en masse as soon as they heard that the guys in front of them were Goums.

VJ Day in Honolulu
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

In Honolulu, where the war began for the U.S., the first news of it’s ending reached a sleepy-eyed Chinese-American radio technician shortly after 1200 hours (12:00 a.m.) when he had just finished making his regular weekly check on KGU’s station transmitter and was ready to leave for home.

Stand by for important news about the Potsdam ultimatum.

Flight nurse, WACs and GIs all streamed from their barracks and joined the howling procession…

VJ Day in San Francisco
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

Some of the highlights: Firecrackers, hoarded in Chinatown for eight years, rattled like machine guns… Servicemen and civilians played tug-of-war with fire hoses… Market Street, the wide bar-lined thoroughfare that has long been the center of interest for visiting GIs and sailors, was littered with the wreckage of smashed War Bond booths … A plump redhead danced naked on the base of the city’s Native Sons monument after servicemen had torn her clothes off. A sailor lent the woman a coat, and the pair disappeared.

Keeping German Diplomats Safe in Paris
(Popular Mechanics, 1919)

In light of the overwhelming hostility toward Germans, whether they come to Paris to sign a peace treaty or for other reasons, the Parisian Gendarmes thought it best to enclose their hotel with palisade-style fencing, which they hoped would serve the dual purpose of keeping them in as much as it would serve to keep hostile natives out.
A photo of the barricade illustrates the article.

United Artists Makes ”Stage Door Canteen”
(Charm, 1943)

During the Second World War there were two prominent canteens where the Allied soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines could go to see and be seen with the glamorous actor types of their day: the Hollywood Canteen in Los Angeles and the Stage Door Canteen in New York City. It was in these two locales that the stars of both stage and screen could be found both waiting and busing tables, preparing food and cracking wise with the volunteers and draftees of the Allied Armies. We needn’t tell you which of these two establishments Hollywood decided to celebrate on celluloid, but you should know that the film was extremely popular- attached is the review as it appeared in fashion magazine of the time.

J. Edgar Hoover on the CPUSA
(Coronet Magazine, 1950)

This Cold War article about the American Communist Party (CPUSA), penned in 1950 by F.B.I. Director J. Edgar Hoover (1895 – 1972) was published for two reasons:

• To alert the readers that such subversive groups exist and that they are operated by their fellow Americans who take orders from Joseph Stalin –

• and that the F.B.I. is on the job and has thoroughly infiltrated their ranks and watches them very closely.

The column is a good read for all of you out there who enjoy the cloak and dagger type of plot lines; I was surprised to learn that this group had so many secrets to hide – seeing that their problems in the arena of public relations at that time were so overwhelming, one has to wonder how they were actually able to tend to their assignments in espionage, sabotage, propaganda and all other assorted shenanigans Moscow expected of them.

Click here to read about the man who spied on the the American Communist Party.

Click here if you would like to read what the CPUSA was up to during the Great Depression.

In time, J. Edgar Hoover’s prestige began to fade…

Japan Has Been Beaten. Now What?
(United States News, 1945)

The big question for the United States is how long American troops are to occupy Japan. The Potsdam Declaration says that the occupying forces of the Allies shall be withdrawn from Japan as soon as the objectives outlined are accomplished and ‘there has been established in accordance with the Japanese people a peacefully inclined and responsible government.’

U.S. officials appear to be thinking in terms of an occupation of only 5 or 10 years. Japanese officials, however, in looking ahead to a resurgence of Japanese power, appear to be thinking in terms of 50 to 100 years.

Read about the German POWs who were schooled in virtues of democracy.

The War Record of the 93rd Division
(The Stars and Stripes, 1919)

A post-Armistice Day feature article that reported on the war-time activities of the four infantry regiments that made up the U.S. Ninety-Third Division (the 369th, 370th, 371st and the 372nd).

Two of these regiments were awarded the coveted Croix de Guerre. Accompanying this history is a black and white illustration of the Division’s insignia.

The War Record of the 93rd Division
(The Stars and Stripes, 1919)

A post-Armistice Day feature article that reported on the war-time activities of the four infantry regiments that made up the U.S. Ninety-Third Division (the 369th, 370th, 371st and the 372nd).

Two of these regiments were awarded the coveted Croix de Guerre. Accompanying this history is a black and white illustration of the Division’s insignia.

Madame X by John Singer Sargent
(Vanity Fair, 1916)

In order to mark the New York arrival of Portrait of Madame X by John Singer Sargent (1856 – 1924), VANITY FAIR’s editors chose to run this anecdote concerning the 1884 creation of the work as well as a reproduction of one of the pencil studies for the profile head of the sitter, Madame Gauterau.

One of the First Bomb Sights
(Popular Mechanics, 1914)

Attached is a photograph and short description of One of the latest bomb-dropping devices that were available to French and British pilots during the earliest days of World War One.

Home Front Ditties
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

Attached is a 1945 article written for the many homesick GIs who wondered what musical treats they were missing in their absence. All the great performers are cataloged as well as a list of many of the most popular home front hits from the top forty.

Popular music back home hasn’t changed much. The same familiar bands play the new hit tunes.

Would you like to read a 1941 article about Boogie-Woogie?

Paris Fashion: Summer, 1916
(Vanity Fair Magazine, 1916)

Paying no mind to the continuing unpleasantness that was taking place somewhere around the Somme (ie. W.W. I), the taste-makers of Paris soldiered-on and created garments for mid-summer that were original and feminine and bore the mark of Paris’ characteristic opulence.

Legendary fashion designer Christian Dior had a good deal of trouble with people who would illegally copy his designs; click here to read about that part of fashion history.

American Trench Periscopes
(America’s Munitions, 1919)

The U.S Army only ordered two types of trench periscopes during the war. The first kind was a simple wooden box, painted a lovely shade of olive drab and measuring two inches square and 15 inches in length with two inclined mirrors set at both ends (pictured). This type was manufactured by two companies and well over 100,000 were produced.

The second variety was a mirror that was designed to fixed to the end of a bayonet, a total of 100,000 of these were delivered before the end of July, 1918 and 50,000 additional ones before November.

(Until we get the title link fixed, you can read the article by clicking here.)

Allied Aerial Reconnaissance During World War I
(Vanity Fair, 1918)

This article,Photography’s Notable Part in the War was written by an active participant in the aerial reconnaissance arm of the Royal Flying Corps, Captain Henry A. Wildon. He reported that both sides in the conflict recognized early on that intelligence gathering by way of camera and aircraft was a real possibility:

Our first airplanes in France were not supplied with photographic equipment. It was not until the beginning of 1915 that the importance of of photography became apparent, and was made possible by improvements in the type and general stability of the airplane.