Rare WWII Posters by Bill Mauldin

In the span of two months, I somehow acquired two rare WWII posters by Bill Mauldin. These are posters that I did not know even existed until I acquired them. As a collecting rule, I try and stay in my lane of original artwork and books, but for Mauldin I make an exception.

Mauldin did a handful of propaganda posters for the army during WWII, all along the lines of rumor mongering, a popular theme during the war. The 45th Division Museum in Oklahoma has three such posters, but this one, done in 1942, appears to be quite scarce. The poster measures 19″x20″ and is titled, “You Can’t Fight on Two Fronts!”. You can see the bloody bayonet aimed at the back of the soldiers, attached to the rifle marked as “Rumors”. At first I thought the red of the blood was applied with watercolor, but looking at it through a loupe, I believe it to be printed, which means they ran the image through a printing press twice.

I’ve only been able to find one other example of this poster, at the Library of Congress. How it survived the war, I’ll never know, but I’m glad it did. This belonged a gentleman who served with Mauldin during the war, both Stateside and in Italy.

This second poster that was inserted into copies of the December 25, 1943 issue of the 45th Division News. According to Todd DePastino’s two-volume set of Mauldin Up Front cartoons, the newspaper crew wanted “to brighten a miserable winter” for the troops, as Mauldin put it. The newspaper financed this venture through sales of Mauldin’s “Mud, Mules and Mountains”. A Neapolitan engraver took a week to turn Mauldin’s watercolored artwork into four-color plates.

I’m not sure how many of these survived. I’m always surprised when fragile stuff like this can survive a war.

And the reverse side of the poster:

If anyone has rare Mauldin material to share, please contact me and we’ll try and feature the material in a future blog post