Antisemitic cartoon workers were required to post in a factory in German occupied Ukraine
Extent and Medium
overall: Height: 8.125 inches (20.638 cm) | Width: 8.125 inches (20.638 cm)
Archival History
The handbill was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2004 by Steve Crane.
Acquisition
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Steve Crane
Funding Note: The cataloging of this artifact has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
Scope and Content
Antisemitic flier that a Russian woman was ordered by the German occupying authorities to post in a Messerschmitt airplane factory where she worked assembling bombs in the Ukraine region of the Soviet Union. Removal of a posted flier was a serious offense with punitive consequences. The bulletin features a caricature of a fat, richly dressed Jewish man as the "the true and only goal of the Bolshevik "World Revolution." The woman who posted the flier saved a copy because she did not want the world to forget the "difficulties." She kept it hidden behind a wooden picture frame and took it with her when she later emigrated to Brazil, and then to the United States. See 2016.184.662 for a color poster of this handbill. Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, breaking the German-Soviet Pact signed in August 1938. Germany remained victorious until autumn 1942 when the Soviet counteroffensive forced them to begin a long retreat. Most of the Ukraine was liberated by 1943.
Conditions Governing Access
No restrictions on access
Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements
Square black-and-white caricature on newsprint with a graphic image of an extremely obese man in a black suit nestled among striped and dotted pillows. His head is near the center of the frame, but all that is visible is a grotesquely large curved nose and 2 fleshy lips with 4 teeth showing. He has a thin beard extending from his nearly bald crown to his lips and a double chin. His hands rest near the white bib spread on his ample stomach; he has rings on both fingers, manicured nails, white cuffs with links, and a big cigar. There is a white Star of David on his lower mid-section. The pillows adjacent to his head have Hebrew characters. A small round table with a demitasse cup, an aperitif glass, and a box labelled OSCURO sits in the foreground. Below the image is a paragraph of German text in black ink. The next paragraph repeats the text in Cyrillic Ukrainian.
Subjects
- World War, 1939-1945--Propaganda--Ukraine.
- Jews in art.
- Anti-Jewish propaganda--Ukraine.
- Nazi propaganda--Posters--Specimens.
- Antisemitism--Germany--Posters.
- Ukraine--History--German occupation, 1941-1944.
- Jews--Caricatures and cartoons.
Genre
- Posters
- Object