United States Office of War Information

"OWI" redirects here. For the criminal offense, see Driving under the influence.

Riveting team working on the cockpit shell of a C-47 cargo plane at the plant of North American Aviation. OWI photo by Alfred T. Palmer, 1942.

The United States Office of War Information (OWI) was a U.S. government agency created during World War II to consolidate government information services. It operated from June 1942 until September 1945. It coordinated the release of war news for domestic use, and, using posters and radio broadcasts, worked to promote patriotism, warned about foreign spies and attempted to recruit women into war work. The office also established an overseas branch which launched a large scale information and propaganda campaign abroad.

Establishment

The OWI was established by Executive Order 9182 on June 13, 1942, to consolidate the functions of the Office of Facts and Figures, OWI's direct predecessor; the Office of Government Reports, and the division of information of the Office for Emergency Management. The Foreign Intelligence Service, Outpost, Publication, and Pictorial Branches of the Office of the Coordinator of Information were also transferred to the OWI. (The Executive order creating OWI, however, stated that dissemination of information to the Latin American countries should be continued by the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs.) Elmer Davis, who was a CBS newsman, was named director of OWI.

Among its wide-ranging responsibilities, OWI sought to review and approve the design and content of government posters. OWI officials felt that the most urgent problem on the home front was the careless leaking of sensitive information that could be picked up by spies and saboteurs.

M-4 tank crew. OWI photo, 1942.

OWI directly produced radio series such as This is Our Enemy (spring 1942), which dealt with Germany, Japan, and Italy; Uncle Sam, which dealt with domestic themes; and Hasten the Day (August 1943), which was about the Home Front. In addition, OWI cleared commercial network scripts through its Domestic Radio Bureau, including the NBC Blue Network's Chaplain Jim. In addition, radio producer Norman Corwin produced several series for OWI, including An American in England, An American in Russia, and Passport for Adams, which starred actor Robert Young. Several thousand lacquer discs (records), made by the Office of War Information were later transferred to the Library of Congress.^[1] There are more than eight thousand programs in English that include propaganda broadcasts from 1942 through 1945.^[1] Recruiting women, from home, to support the wartime effort was a job that the OWI deemed for the radio. Eventually there was too much war program activity. There was such a rivalry between broadcasters that the Office of Facts and Figures (Later renamed the OWI) started scheduling the broadcasts. A constant channel of communication between the OWI and professional radio allowed, from time to time, the re-examination of policy and that often raised questions or disputes.^[2] Program technique was often in question. Some advertising agencies believed that the war message should be regarded and treated as sales, separated from the entertainment portions. This would achieve a more clairvoyant point of view. The contrary point of view advocated that war messages were to be put directly into radio story-line messaging.^[2]

During 1942 and 1943, the OWI contained two photographic units whose photographers documented the country's mobilization during the early years of the war, concentrating on such topics as aircraft factories and women in the workforce In addition, the OWI produced a series of 267 newsreels in 16 mm film, The United Newsreel which were shown overseas and to U.S. audiences. These newsreels incorporated U.S. military footage. Examples can be seen at this Google list.

OWI also established the Voice of America in 1942, which remains in service today as the official government broadcasting service of the United States. The VOA's initial transmitters were loaned from the commercial networks, and among the programs OWI produced were those provided by the Labor Short Wave Bureau, whose material came from the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations.

Servicing a Douglas A-20 Havoc bomber. OWI photo, 1942.

The Bureau of Motion Pictures (BMP) was formed under OWI to network with Hollywood. Every film had the opportunity to diminish or enhance America’s war effort, and America's reputation abroad.^[3] According to Elmer Davis, director of OWI in 1942, “The easiest way to inject a propaganda idea into most people’s minds is to let it go through the medium of an entertainment picture when they do not realize that they are being propagandized.”^[4] Films that had the most impression received the most attention, and included those depicting the armed forces, showing the United States as a democratic nation or a united society, and also the ideology of the enemy.^[5] Until July 1942 influence was placed on Hollywood only by patriotic persuasion, by review of movies already produced prior to release, and by the “Manual for the Motion-Picture Industry”. In July, OWI found the best way to have an effect upon Hollywood was to be present during the production of feature films. This was a result of the screening of Little Tokyo, U.S.A. which showed a complete intolerance for Japanese-Americans. The main focus in favor of the war effort should be security of the nation, not the ideals set forth by the writers and producers.^[6] The presence of OWI in Hollywood was enhanced as time went by, and by the fourth quarter in 1943 every studio, except for Paramount, allowed OWI to read all movie scripts. Overall, Hollywood was interested in helping with the war effort, and was mostly cooperative.^[7] Although, OWI had no censorship powers and failure to comply had no repercussions, their question to studios was simple: “Will this picture help us win the war?”^[8]

The Psychological Warfare Branch, used radio and print media to demoralize enemy soldiers and to discourage enemy civilians.^[9] Print media was distributed in two manners: newspapers written in the foreign language and “leaflet warfare”.^[10] Initially a modest industry, leaflet warfare boomed during World War II. It was utilized in Northern Africa, Italy, Germany, Philippines, and Japan. For example, during the war in Japan, the OWI printed and dropped over 180 million leaflets, with about 98 million being dropped the summer months of 1945.^[11] The other forms of media were newspapers and publicized magazines. Magazines distributed to foreign audiences, such as Victory, moved to show how the people of America were contributing to the war.^[12] Victory was used to showcase the American manufacturing power and to foster an appreciation for the American lifestyle.^[13]

Aside from the aforementioned publication and production styles of propaganda, the Office of War information also utilized miscellaneous and unconventional ways of delivering messages known as "specialty items." Specific examples of these items include packets of seeds, matchbooks, soap paper, and sewing kits. The packets of seeds had an American flag and a message printed on the outside which identified the donor. The matchbooks were inscribed with the Four Freedoms on the inside of the covers, which were then widespread overseas. One of the more detailed records comes with the soap paper. The paper was meant to lather the body quickly, and was transfused with a message: "From your friends the United Nations. Dip in water - use like soap. WASH OFF THE NAZI DIRT." The sewing kit included a unique pincushion. The side that was used to stick the pins was shaped like a human rear end. On the other side, a caricatured face of either Hitler or Japanese General Hideki Tojo was imprinted.^[14]

The Foreign Moral Analysis division of Pacific affairs, under the leadership of George E. Taylor commissioned a series of studies designed to help policymakers' understanding of enemy psychology. Among these studies were The Chrysanthemum and the Sword by Ruth Benedict and John Embree’s The Japanese Nation: A Social Survey (New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1945).^[15]

People

Among the many people who worked for the OWI were Jay Bennett (author), Humphrey Cobb, Alan Cranston, Milton S. Eisenhower, Ernestine Evans, John Fairbank, Lee Falk, Howard Fast, Alexander Hammid, Jane Jacobs, Lewis Wade Jones, David Karr, Philip Keeney, Christina Krotkova, Owen Lattimore, Murray Leinster, Paul Linebarger, Irving Lerner, Archibald MacLeish, Edgar Ansel Mowrer, Charles Olson, Gordon Parks, James Reston, Peter Rhodes, Arthur Rothstein, Waldo Salt, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., William Stephenson, George E. Taylor, Chester S. Williams, and Flora Wovschin.

Aviation Ordnanceman stationed at the Naval Air Station Corpus Christi installing a M1919 Browning machine gun. OWI photo by Howard R. Hollem, 1942.

Many of these people were active supporters of President Roosevelt's New Deal and extolled the President's policies in OWI-supported radio programs such as This is War, which irritated Congressional opponents.^[16][17]

Some of the writers, producers, and actors of OWI programs admired the Soviet Union and were either loosely affiliated with or were members of the Communist Party USA.^[18] The director of Pacific operations for the OWI, Owen Lattimore, who later accompanied U.S. Vice-President Henry Wallace on a mission to China and Mongolia in 1944, was later alleged to be a Soviet agent on the basis of testimony by a defector from the Soviet GRU, General Alexander Barmine.^[19][20][21] In his final report, Elmer Davis noted that he had fired 35 employees, because of past Communist associations, though the FBI files showed no formal allegiance to the CPUSA.

Soviet spy

Flora Wovschin was later revealed to have been a Soviet spy. At Columbia University she met Marion Davis Berdecio and Judith Coplon, both of whom Wovschin recruited into service for the Soviet NKVD spy agency. After World War II, she renounced her U.S. citizenship and lived in the Soviet Union.

Opposition and termination

Congressional opposition to the domestic operations of the OWI resulted in increasingly curtailed funds. In 1943, the OWI's appropriations were cut out of the fiscal year 1944 budget and only restored with strict restrictions on what OWI could do domestically. Many branch offices were closed and the Motion Picture Bureau was closed down. By 1944 the OWI operated mostly in the foreign field, contributing to undermining enemy morale. The agency was abolished in 1945, and its foreign functions were transferred to the Department of State.

The OWI was terminated, effective September 15, 1945, by an executive order of August 31, 1945.

See also

• Frank Shozo Baba
• Committee on Public Information

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b} http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awrs9/owi.html
2. ^ ^{a b} Landry, Robert J., The Impact of OWI on Broadcasting, 1943, Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Association for Public Opinion Research, (1943): 114.
3. ^ Black, Gregory D., and Clayton Koppes. "What to Show the World: The Office of War Information and Hollywood, 1942-1945." The Journal of American History 64.1 (1977): 90.
4. ^ Black, Gregory D., and Clayton Koppes "What to Show the World: The Office of War Information and Hollywood, 1942-1945." The Journal of American History 64.1 (1977): 88.
5. ^ Worland, Rick. "OWI Meets the Monsters: Hollywood Horror Films and War Propaganda, 1942 to 1945." Cinema Journal 37.1 (1997): 48.
6. ^ Black, Gregory D., and Clayton Koppes "What to show the World: The Office of War Information and Hollywood, 1942-1945." The Journal of American History 64.1 (1977): 91.
7. ^ Black, Gregory D., and Clayton Koppes "What to show the World: The Office of War Information and Hollywood, 1942-1945." The Journal of American History 64.1 (1977): 103.
8. ^ Worland, Rick. "OWI Meets the Monsters: Hollywood Horror Films and War Propaganda, 1942 to 1945." Cinema Journal 37.1 (1997): 50.
9. ^ Winkler, Allan M., The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945, Yale University Press, (1978): 142.
10. ^ Williams, Josette H., “Paths to Peace: The Information War in the Pacific, 1945,” Journal of the American Intelligence Professional, online source, 2002, Vol. 46 (3). https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol46no3/article07.html
11. ^ Winkler, Allan M., The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945, Yale University Press, (1978): 79.
12. ^ Winkler, Allan M., The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945, Yale University Press, (1978): 67.
13. ^ Winkler, Allan M., The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945, Yale University Press, (1978): 155-6.
14. ^ Winkler, Allan M., The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945, Yale University Press, (1978): 80.
15. ^ John King Fairbank, Chinabound: A Fifty-Year Memoir (New York: Harper & Row, 1982): 290.
16. ^ Loviglio, Jason, Radio in Wartime: The Politics of Propaganda, Race, and the American Way in the Second World War, American Quarterly, Vol.56, No. 4 (December 2004), pp. 1079-1087
17. ^ Cogan, Brian, and Kelso, Tony, Encyclopedia of Politics, the Media, and Popular Culture, New York: Greenwood Publishing Group (2009), ISBN 9780313343797, 0313343799, p. 157
18. ^ John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America, New Haven: Yale University Press (1999), ISBN 0300084625, 9780300084627, pp. 197-198
19. ^ FBI Report, "Owen Lattimore, Internal Security - R, Espionage - R," September 8, 1949 (FBI File: Owen Lattimore, Part 1A), p. 2 (PDF p. 7): Six years prior to the Barmine revelations in his 1948 interview, the FBI had already compiled a thick security dossier on Lattimore at the onset of World War II, recommending that he be put under "Custodial Detention in case of National Emergency."
20. ^ Absent-Minded Professor?, Time Magazine, Monday, Mar. 10, 1952
21. ^ Testimony of Alexander Barmine, July 31, 1951, U. S. Congress, Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Internal Security Subcommittee, Institute of Pacific Relations, Hearings, 82nd Congress, First Session (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1951), Part 1, pp. 199-200

References

• Allan Winkler, The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978)
• Howard Blue, Words at War: World War II Radio Drama and the Postwar Broadcast Industry Blacklist (Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press, 2002). ISBN 0-8108-4413-3.

External links

• OWI images at the Museum of the City of New York
• OWI recordings at the Library of Congress
• Images from the Farm Security Administration-Office of War Information Collection (Library of Congress)
• Records of the Office of War Information (OWI) in the National Archives
• World War II OWI posters
• World War Poster Collection hosted by the Universtity of North Texas Libraries' Digital Collections
• The Papers of Edward P. Lilly, special assistant to the director of OWI 1944-1945, Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library
• Papers of Paul Sturman, Foreign Language Division of OWI, Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library