---
title: Automotive mechanics. Stick to your job! Read this official statement
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/automotive-mechanics-stick-to-your-job-1943/
description: 'Text-only labour-retention notice in a red, white and blue border: ''Automotive Mechanics - Stick to Your Job!'' with an Office of Defense Transportation'
section: Collection
---

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3. Automotive mechanics. Stick to your job! Read this official statement

[![Automotive mechanics. Stick to your job! Read this official statement, 1943 US poster: Text-only labour-retention notice](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/automotive-mechanics-stick-to-your-job-1943.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/automotive-mechanics-stick-to-your-job-1943.jpg)

# Automotive mechanics. Stick to your job! Read this official statement

Text-only labour-retention notice in a red, white and blue border: 'Automotive Mechanics - Stick to Your Job!' with an Office of Defense Transportation 'Essential Transportation Worker' badge. It quotes the War Manpower Commission chairman, declares transport repair 'a war job', and tells mechanics not to transfer. Authority and official status carry the appeal; there is no pictorial element beyond the badge.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Glittering generalities](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/glittering-generalities/) [Testimonial](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/testimonial/)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
AUTOMOTIVE MECHANICS STICK TO YOUR JOB!
ESSENTIAL TRANSPORTATION WORKER
OFFICIALLY APPROVED
ODT
OFFICE OF DEFENSE TRANSPORTATION
KEEP 'EM ROLLING
READ THIS OFFICIAL STATEMENT
On February 13, 1943, Mr. Paul V. McNutt, chairman of the War Manpower Commission, made the following statement:
"The whole objective of the Manpower Program is to have the right workers in the right war jobs at the right time. It is not helping your Government reach that objective if you leave a job which is useful to the war to find a place doing something for which you have no skill."
THE OPERATION OF TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS AND THE REPAIR AND MAINTENANCE OF TRANSPORTATION EQUIPMENT IS A WAR JOB. . . . It has been designated by the War Manpower Commission as an essential activity. . . . Remember this, and if your job as a truck driver or a mechanic is the highest skilled job you can perform, you are the right worker in the right job.
STAY ON THE JOB AND DO NOT TRANSFER TO WORK WHERE YOUR PARTICULAR SKILL IS NOT USED TO ITS HIGHEST CAPACITY.
OTTO S. BEYER, Director
Division of Transport Personnel
OFFICE OF DEFENSE TRANSPORTATION
AUTOMOTIVE COUNCIL FOR WAR PRODUCTION
```

[← Attention, Women! Join the WAAC](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/attention-women-join-the-waac-1943/) [Aviation cadet training →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/aviation-cadet-training-1943/)

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