Gloria Shacklett Christy, The Murfreesboro Post
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — Charged with the task of selling wartime government programs and war bonds to the American public, the War Advertising Council and the War Finance Committee sought to promote voluntary compliance with bond-buying quotas and rationing programs, while at the same time contributing to morale on the home front.
During World War II, these organizations produced one of the largest, broadest, most ambitious advertising and public relations campaigns ever given to any government agency in the history of the United States.
Several Japanese midget submarines that participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, were found beached. These vessels known as the HA-19s were supposed to penetrate the harbor and attack the U.S. Pacific Fleet.
None of them managed to damage or sink any U.S. ship. Problems with their gyrocompass developed, forcing them to run aground.
One of the HA-19s wassoon put on a countrywide tour to help sell bonds.
This captured Japanese submarine became the centerpiece for the bond-selling tour in several communities around the country.
Local community volunteer and organizer Annie Burns Roberts could hardly believe her eyes. The efforts of she and her committee had finally paid off bringing this captured, two-man Japanese submarine to Murfreesboro.
Of course, all this would not have been possible if the arrangements had not been made by her friend Jean Faircloth MacArthur , who was married to Gen. Douglas MacArthur, had been a hometown girl. Now, she was married to one of World War II’s most famous generals.
She was able to use her influence to bring the submarine to town.
It was an easy sell.
Rutherford County had sold more war bonds, more than 150,000, than any other county in the state of Tennessee. It had truly been a grand effort by the entire community.
Tommy Martin, a long time resident of Murfreesboro and a colonel in the state guard made the remark concerning this massive unified initiative,
“Can’t keep a squirrel on the ground, and you can’t stop the good folks of Rutherford County when they get united,” he said.
The tour had been having a unifying effect, and now it had arrived here.
There was an anxious moment or two as this huge, slender vessel could hardly make the turn, barely missing the corner of the buildings to be positioned on the north side of the Historic Square.
The excitement whirled the crowd into a furor of patriotic sentiment as the bands from Sewart Air Force Base and Middle Tennessee State College marched down the street.
Many town folk came to give what little economic resources they had to buy more war bonds.
After all, it was this concerted effort that was making a difference to their sons and daughters participating in the all consuming global conflict.
Perhaps in this day, just as they did in World War II in the midst of swift and confusing happenings, we need to pause for a moment and recall America’s place in history.
Every generation of Americans must clarify and redefine their purpose.
The words of President George Washington spoken in his first inaugural address in 1789 exhort us even now: “The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered … deeply… finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.”
In our time as with the greatest generation of World War II, we must exhibit the consistency of character that our forefathers did in the midst of uncertainty and peril to protect and triumphantly perpetuate the spirit and faith of America.