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Praetorium Honoris

Tuesday, April 30, 2019

Something Not Completely Different (redux post)


Since Beans has been working overtime and Sarge is enjoying some time off, I thought I'd try to pick up a shift here at the Chant.  This uses most of a post I wrote 5 years ago.  While re-reading it, I noticed that I've been unsatisfied with the course of our country for quite a while.  And that my posts often aspire to a simpler time when certain values were more common and unquestioned.  The posters are representative of that time to some extent, so I usually save them to some folder on my computer for later posting.  Here are a few of them, followed by the post from 2014 below Lincoln's quote.  These "new" ones are also focused on the military, but are mostly specific to the Naval service.  


Gotta love the Forrestal Class Carriers, mainly because I flew off one- USS Independence (before they ruined the name by giving it to an LCS).  #60 is the Saratoga.



I'm not sure we tie the Boy Scouts to patriotic values these days.  Not that they aren't, but they aren't all boys, some are all girls, their values have been corrupted for a PC world, and they aren't even called the Boy Scouts now.

The Few, the Proud...




I think I remember this one from the time my father was in the Navy.  Probably early 70's.



I've always liked this poster.  Now that the USMC Raiders are back, we may see more of them.







It appears that after Korea, the USAF stole Naval Aviation's tag line- Aim High!  Oh well, I guess we weren't using it anymore and the trademark must have expired.  

While I fully admit to being the sometimes angry, part-time pithy political blogger here on The Chant, I've mellowed a bit.  That might be because there's a conservative in the White House, but also because I'm older.  I don't think my ranting here in this forum compares at all to the vile hatred directed to the current White House resident though.  I wrote the referenced post 5 years ago in the middle of President Obama's second term, and while I ranted quite a bit, and disagreed with his governance style and politics, hate was never part of the equation.  I think that a healthy serving of hate for the other side is responsible for half the problems in this country.  Are they difficult problems?  Absolutely.  We're far too dependent on social programs; our debt is growing impossible to service; victimhood is treaing at the fabric of our country, but some honest hard work and respect for both the truth and the other side, could probably work wonders.  As long as we all "come together." See what I did there?  It's a call back to the intro poster.  Ok, it loses something if I have to explain it!

Anyway, about these posters, above and below.  Do you have any favorites of your own?  Let me know, or send them to me.  Maybe I'll make a post out of them.   

Ok, that's enough.  Now back to your regularly scheduled bloggers, following a special replay of my 2014 post. 
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If you couldn't tell by my semi-frequent posts, I like this site.  I think you do too because you wouldn't be here otherwise.  I like it because it's a welcome and familiar place that discusses items that are funny, interesting, usually aligned with my way of thinking, and often of a historic nature.

History.  I enjoy reading or watching history because I believe in the axiom that if we ignore history we are doomed to repeat it.  I'm fascinated by accounts of our past trials and triumphs, how brutal humans can be in war and daily life, but also how much compassion and assistance we can give our fellow man.


While I'm not ready to say the U.S. is going to hell in a hand-basket, I don't believe we're becoming a more moral society, one that holds fast to common values of fairness and decency, of ethical behavior and incorruptible principles.  In our society, there's far too much emphasis on sexuality and personal or individual morality.  Far too many men who see nothing wrong with sex without love and commitment, and too many women who let them.  Too little shame and public scorn that tended to keep some behaviors in check.  There are too many politicians without honor, and too few government leaders who represent us. There's a big difference there, between politicians and leaders.  We also seem to be losing the value of hard work and personal responsibility, and some have forgotten the importance of saving for the future.


I like history because it reminds me of a simpler time when those values were first on everyone's mind- when the Greatest Generation was fighting for our values, and sacrificing so much to keep them.  These posters remind me of that time and is something completely different for today.

Probably a WWI-era recruiting poster, but it helps me make my point.
After Pearl Harbor and throughout WWII, our men ran to the recruiting office to sign up and defend our nation.






My Grandfather, working in Hawaii with the Army Corps of Engineers, re-upped on Dec 8th, 1941, again becoming a SeaBee.


While he was off building runways in the Pacific, my Uncle Paul, his 15 year old son, ran off a year later to join the Coast-Guard, convincing some recruiter that he was 18.


It wasn't just the men who served.  Women joined up, and served in many other ways back at home.




I've always respected the military nurse- probably because my mom was one, although not in WWII.


While I was Navy, I get a bit of credit from Sarge because my mom was an Air Force Nurse in the 60's.
 
                                    

The women didn't just work- they scrimped and saved and sacrificed to help the war effort.  As did everyone else at home.


                                                                     
Not sure if this is a fake or just unintentionally patronizing due to the times  .

       


They did this to support the men who fought-

 

          

 

It wasn't just posters of fighting men and the sacrifices needed to keep them fighting.  Propaganda in the form of...ahem...public service announcements was popular. 


                         
They weren't just about STDs though-

         

 

And we weren't in it alone -

 

After it was all over though, they were welcomed home with open arms-


 



I like these old posters, and the vintage reproductions.  While I can't say they bring me back to another time, since that was before my time, they do help me to remember our history- a time when Americans all pulled together for the greater good, and values of hard work and sacrifice helped us win a war.  Definitely something different from today, maybe even something completely different.

31 comments:

  1. Bravo Tuna! A masterpiece!

    Nicely laid out and I love the way you took us through the story, using your words to amplify the pictures.

    Your best yet and that's saying a lot!

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    1. Thanks. I've been collecting those posters on my computer for a while now and thought this was a good way to share them. As for the lay-out, blogger is a b!%c# and really hard to format the placement of these different sized pictures. If there's a trick to it, let me know.

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    2. Oh, and the point wasn't lost on me that I posted this the day after you had a Monty Python reference, and my title borrows from one of their Flying Circus catchphrases.

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    3. 1) I thought you did a great job of distributing the pictures on the page. And yes, Blogger is an absolute bear when trying to position photos. When I have more than one photo to put on a line, I'll combine them using MS Paint, position them there and then save the whole mish-mosh under a new name. Then paste it into the post. Blogger sometimes hates pictures. For no apparent reason.

      2) I noticed that when you mentioned it. D'oh!

      (Aside: how did you know that I had nothing ready for today? You're like prescient or something! Again - good job and Thanks!)

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    4. Oh, forgot to mention this. Did you know that last photo was a German soldier? Curious as to where you found that one. Personally I like it.

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    5. Oops! Good picture though.Definitely captures the emotion.

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    6. Re: Comment about Tuna being psychic or something. You did say on Sunday that Monday was juvat and Tuesday was Tuna and Wednesday may be LUSH...

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    7. “absolute bear” !!! Hrmph. Your racism has been noted.

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    8. Wouldn't that be 'specieism'?

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    9. I’m a human that self-identifies as a bear. So it’s a little complicated. My driver’s license even says “A Bear” on it, so don’t be a hater.

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  2. Great stuff! Can't imagine any of these being produced today. First of all, almost everyone is caucasian, and the traditional sex roles and family values would certainly be seen as rayciss hate speech today.

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  3. Yep, I'm doing one a week of the recruiting posters... All the way to the elections... Just as a reminder!

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  4. Great posters, and good column. I remember my parents' stories of living through WWII on the homefront. Ration cards, Victory gardens, swapping for car tires and gasoline, shoes, nylon stockings, etc. Everybody worked hard and shared what they had. I wonder if we would be as strong as they were back then.

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  5. Great post! Reminds me of the countless hours I spent poring over the old WWII era LIFE magazines my mom and dad had. The product ads also had a similar patriotic slant to them. Like you said, nor sure they'd be 'socially acceptable' to a vocal minority today.

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    1. Thanks. I would have done that too. I still like looking at old magazines- mainly for the ads, to see how different they are from today.

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  6. A Tuna classic, love the additional posters!

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    1. Thanks. I will have to get blogger training on how to make a redux post a new post, vice re-posting the same one. I didn't realize that is what I did until I saw the 2014 comments!

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  7. A good many of these I had never seen before and wasn't reading this blog five years ago, good posting Tuna.

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  8. We will try this again, with correct spellings! ( Kindle's have very small keyboards ) I was going to say, well done, tuna, but that sounded too much like pan fried bluegill. So, I shall say, I quite liked this post!I swiped most of the posters!

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    1. I can spend hours on Pinterest looking at these. There are literally thousands. Our WWII Allies had their share of them as well.

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  9. Although you don't post often, when you do you do an outstanding job.

    Thanks for the post.
    Paul L. Quandt

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  10. What PLQ said!

    It's easy to focus when you have a common external enemy. Not so easy when its an internal fight. Sigh.

    I have always loved the poster where the Navy gunner is passing ammo. Mahaps we can re-invent that poster and have it say "Your NAVY wants GUNS!"

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  11. Yup! Hear,hear!
    Marvelous, emotional and aimed at the audience with deadly accuracy.
    But wait! The Navy has airplanes?

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  12. That’s a good collection of propganda posters, but at least two are of the “photoshop phake” variety...

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    1. Yeah, the STD ones are a bit over-the-top for that era. Probably more than two- I'm sure the one touting "Manliness" is a recent creation, as is the give 'em hell one.

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  13. We had quite a few of those posted in various compartments and spaces aboard the Iowa.

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