Adolf Hitler's office

Photographer unknown

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U.S. Marine Corps women's boot camp, 1943

By Jack Brummet

This is a photo of my mom, Betty, in Marine Corps boot camp in 1943. She's in the top row, fourth from the left. On her right is her friend Loa (she named my sister after her).

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Drawing: 1841 — The President asks a question

by Jack Brummet

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Victor Lundy's sketchbooks

By Jack Brummet

Victor Lundy, born in NYC in 1923, was an art and architecture student who later enlisted during World War II. Throughout training and when he was deployed in Europe, he kept a set of sketchbooks of the people and scenes around him. After the war, he became a famous/successful architect. You can find selections from the sketchbooks here, on Retronaut.

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Pearl Harbor Day, 75 years later

by Jack Brummet

Remembering Pearl Harbor. My Uncle Bill enlisted in the Navy the next day (I think!). Both of my parents enlisted―father in the navy too (he had already served in the army) and my mother Betty in the Marine Corps. 

My mother remembers Japanese kids being led out of Ballard High later, on their way to the internment camps. Some of the students lined up and booed.

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The bulletproof bible

From the 1950's.  They still make bulletproof Bibles in 20016, but instead of a gold-plated cover, they use high tech plastics and Kevlar.

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Mahatma Gandhi's 1939 letter to Adolf Hitler

By Jack Brummet, World War II Ed.

I have not been able to determine if the Chancellor responded to Gandhi's letter. . .

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Run, Rudolph, Run: a reindeer watches a German bomb strike over Russia

A confused reindeer watches German planes bombing Mourmansk, Russia in 1941.  Photograph by Yevgeny Khaldey.

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A most curious towel advertisement from World War II

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The fake town that hid Seattle's Boeing plant No. 2 from the Japanese during World War II

By Jack Brummet, Seattle history ed.

After Pearl Harbor, Boeing Plant No. 2 in Seattle (where B 17 bombers were built) was put under heavy camouflage to prevent a Japanese aircraft attack. The roof of the huge plant was covered with fake houses, streets, and trees. No Japanese planes came anywhere near the factory (my Mom was a riveter there before she enlisted). The plant is under the darker area in the center of the above photograph. The middle shot shows employees (allegedly, but they seem like models/actors) hanging out on the roof, and a view of the roof from street level.

A closer view of the 35-acre roof of Boeing Plant 2, with homes built of canvas, trees and shrubs made of board and mesh, and streets of oil and dirt:

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Easter eggs for Hitler

By Jack Brummet, World War II Ed.

On Easter Sunday, 1945, almost 70 years ago now, Sergeant William E. Thomas and Private First Class Joseph Jackson put together a special “Easter Eggs” gift for Adolph Hitler and the German Army.

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Photo: Adolph Hitler in the 4th grade (1899)

Adolf Hitler in the 4th grade, circa 1899. Hitler is dead center in the top row. 

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Heinrich Hoffman's stunning photos of The Fuhrer that Hitler ordered destroyed

By Jack Brummet, World War II Ed.

This strange set of photos show Hitler posing for photographer Heinrich Hoffmann while listening to a recording of his own speeches. Adolph Hitler wanted to see what he would look like to the German people as he delivered his thunderous speeches.  

After seeing the photographs, Hitler ordered Hoffmann to destroy the negatives.  Hoffman instead tucked them away, where they were discovered by the Allies after the war.  

Egon Hanfstaengl, the son of Hitler's foreign press officer, said in a documentary, Fatal Attraction Of Hitler: "He had that ability which is needed to make people stop thinking critically and just emote."

These photographs are considered to be in the public domain in the US due to their status as seized Nazi property (otherwise their copyrights would not yet have expired).

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A caricature of Betty Jones Brummet

By Jack Brummet

My mom--Betty Jones Brummet--is turning 90 years old this week.

This image is a caricature an artist drew of her when she was on a weekend pass from The Marines during World War II (about 1944).

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Churchill addresses troops in the Roman amphitheatre at Carthage, Tunisia

By Jack Brummet, WW II Ed.

Prime Minister Winston Churchill addresses British troops in the old Roman amphitheatre at Carthage, Tunisia, on June 1st, 1943.  

Used by permission of the British Imperial War Museums, © IWM (NA 3255).

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Ezra Pound: Canto 120

By Ezra Pound [1]

[Richard Avedon's 1958 photos of Ezra Pound, shortly after he was released from his 13 year stint in St. Elizabeth's mental hospital in Washington, D.C., where he was committed in lieu of being tried for treason for his broadcasts from Italy during WW II]

"I have tried to write Paradise

Do not move
let the wind speak
that is paradise

Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made.”

[1] E.P. wrote many wonderful and some baffling works.  I truly love a lot of the Cantos.  The problem with liking E.P. are the broadcasts, and his virulent rants about the the Jews and the alleged international banking conspiracy.  He broadcast hundreds of addresses over Italian radio, paid for by the Italian government.  And of course, when the Americans liberated Italy, one of the first persons they came looking for was Ez.   So, how do you reconcile this?  Do good works somehow ameliorate the invective and hate speech?  I've read about anti-Jewish comments coming from people I admire (just a sampling: Harry Truman, T.S. Eliot, Lennin, Churchill, Martin Luther, George Washington), , and whose work I love. My best friend (R.I.P.) had a thing about Jewish people...not hatred I don't think, but a very deep mistrust  Do you forgive and forget, or forgive but never forget?  Maybe it all falls under "hate the sin; love the sinner."

Of the mainly poor blue collar families people I grew up with, there was plenty of animosity toward African-Americans.  Until I was maybe in high school, I don't think I ever heard anyone describe them as black, or even negro.  Except on television.  They used the other four words--the n word, the c word, the j word, and the s word.
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Caricature of Betty Jones Brummet , drawn on Olivera Street, Los Angeles, in 1945

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Five favorite (U.S.) World War II propaganda posters

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Great Britain's attempt to turn Adolf Hitler into a woman

By Jack Brummet,
Military History Editor

When World War II seemed like it would never end, with Germany's unending pursuit of real estate, America dragging her feet, and the relentless Blitzkrieg pounding London almost nightly, British spooks cooked up a plan to insinuate Hitler’s food with female sex hormones (e.g., estrogen) in hopes of taming the killer inside him.


Counterintelligence agents came up with a plan to smuggle doses of estrogen into his food to make him less aggressive.  The Fuhrer, natch, had a battery of food tasters.   But estrogen is colorless, tasteless, and odorless, and works slowly.  The food tasters would never detect it.

[Editor's note:   This reminds us of the wacky CIA plans cooked up in the 60's to poison Fidel Castro's cigars, and another one to slip him drugs that would make his beard and hair fall out.]

The Allied plan to nudge Hitler into womanhood is just one of the many bizarre plots detailed in a cool new book: Secret Weapons: Technology, Science And The Race To Win World War II, by Brian Ford.  You could buy a copy here.

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Two Marines: Betty & William Jennings Bryan Jones

My mom, Betty Echo Jones, and her father William Jennings Bryan Jones in about 1943.  My grandpa had re-enlisted in the Marines when World War II started (he had also been in the Marines in World War I). 

This picture was taken by one of the Seattle newspapers as part of a "human interest story" when my mom enlisted in the Marines during World War II.  The photo did not please her mother, who had long since divorced my grandpa.

click to enlarge

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