Project Scrapbook and Other Amazing Stories

From left to right, Dr. Jerome Tweton, the senior consultant to the North Dakota humanities council, North Dakota Senator Kent Conrad and Carol Harsh, co-director of the Smithsonian's Museum on Main Street program.

This photo was taken in Cavalier, North Dakota, the first stop of the 2003 North Dakota tour of Produce for Victory. The Senator spoke at the opening of the importance of not forgetting those that have sacrificed for our country. (pop. 1,508)

The local exhibition pictured next to "Produce for Victory" are
framed original posters on loan from the North Dakota Heritage Center.
The photo was taken at the opening in Cavalier, North Dakota. (pop. 1,508)

"The Ghost Squadron" stands in front of a tank in Cavalier, North Dakota.
The Niverville, Manitoba group refurbish vintage military equipment.

A winning entry in a home front poster contest in
Homer, Louisiana. (pop. 4,152)

A tribute to home front heroes in Meridian, Mississippi
during the tour of "Produce for Victory." (pop. 41,036)

Ethel Kelly, a real "Rosie", at age nineteen left Lousiana and traveled to Burbank, California to work in the Lockheed plant as a riviter. She is seen posing by the "We
Can Do It" poster in Meridian, Mississippi. (pop. 41,036)

Toys made in a German POW camp during the war in
Springfield, Tennessee. (pop. 11,227)

Members of a community theater group developed an original
musical, Rosie the Riveter, to augment "Produce for Victory"
at the Museum of San Rafael in Castle Dale, Utah. Cast
members - whose performance attracted several hundred
visitors to the museum - pose by a poster from the
exhibition. (pop. 1,704)

Lawrenceville, Illinois welcomes "Produce for Victory"
with a parade featuring the Veterans of Foreign Wars
honor guard, the high school marching band, and
floats. (pop. 4,897)

Other Amazing Stories
When Produce for Victory opened in Tullulah, LA, Ethel Kelly, who inspired the "We Can Do It" WWII poster showed up at the opening. She went to every opening in Louisiana and shared her amazing story. Who would have thought that a young, newly married woman from Delhi, LA whose husband was serving in Europe, would hop a bus to Burbank, CA to work the swing shift in a plant for the war effort would wind up being one of the most recognizable faces from the era. After the war she simply returned home, with her husband, to run a grocery store chain. Larry Bird, Produce for Victory curator at NMAH, says the poster was used for only a short time during the war and the artist is the only one who knows for sure who inspired him, but that Ms. Kelly still has her rivet gun, her inspection stamp, and several photos (all of which Larry says he would take in a minute if she ever wanted to donate them to the Smithsonian).

As part of their Produce for Victory programming, Springfield, TN hosted an honorary graduation ceremony for veterans who had gone off to fight in WWII before graduating from high school. With children and grandchildren in the audience, as 35 seventy year plus veterans walked across the stage their war era photo was projected on the large screen behind them.

When Produce for Victory was in Delta, UT, where the Topaz Japanese-American Internment Camp had been during WWII, the town hosted a reunion of internees and towns people who had operated the camp during the war. It was the first time many of them had seen each other in over 50 years.

Cooking Contests with rationed ingredients resulted in the development of a WWII ration cookbook in Effingham, Illinois. Proceeds from the sale of the cookbook went to the library.

The folks in Boonville, Missouri held discussion programs in an historic town movie theater. It featured Hollywood classics of the forties, period newsreels, popcorn and coke at 1940's prices.

The University of West Virginia compiled oral histories of home front memories taped at each site for preservation. They also organized the systematic collection of nearly 1000 fifty-year old photographs newly cataloged and deposited in the State Archives.

In Vernal, Utah, a tabloid was created that featured news articles and ads that appeared locally during the war years: rationing, local stories of desertion, the rural exodus to urban factories, and local memories of POW Camps.

In Lawrenceville, Illinois a college level course was developed entitled, "Victory on the Home Front: Oral Histories of WWII" which gave students an opportunity to conduct video histories of senior citizens. Tapes were edited for local broadcast and archived at the local historical society.

The Oregon Humanities Council discovered the wife and brother of Robert Diez, the Tuskegee Airman featured on the now famous WWII poster.

When Produce for Victory went to Hepner, Oregon, the director of the Morrow County Museum used her new found stature because she had "single-handedly arranged for the Smithsonian to come to town" to attract public attention to the financial plight of the museum and was able to levy tax dollars to keep the museum's doors open.

In Franklinton, LA, as the town prepared to host Produce for Victory, a local bank donated a complete HVAC system to the museum and the state gave $30,000 to construct bathrooms in the museum.

In preparation for Produce for Victory in Moreland, GA, the local coordinator wrote a grant to the Department of Transportation asking for funds to make Moreland, GA (pop 500) a "destination" location so tourists would get off the interstate to visit; they were able to put a new roof and public restrooms in an old mill to make it a permanent museum.

In Lompoc, CA visitation during the time Produce for Victory was up was the highest in its 26-year history--10 times more than usual!

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