---
title: Chuck it in the trash can
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/chuck-it-in-the-trash-can-1941/
description: 'Industrial fire-safety poster: a hand in a blue shirt sleeve reaches down toward a trash can holding crumpled paper and rags.'
section: Collection
---

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3. Chuck it in the trash can

[![Chuck it in the trash can, 1941 US poster: Industrial fire-safety poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/chuck-it-in-the-trash-can-1941.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/chuck-it-in-the-trash-can-1941.jpg)

# Chuck it in the trash can

Industrial fire-safety poster: a hand in a blue shirt sleeve reaches down toward a trash can holding crumpled paper and rags, under the headline 'Chuck it in the trash can'. The line 'Rubbish underfoot may mean fire overhead' sets the risk as the tell (fear-appeal), though it is mild and practical in tone.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

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

```
Chuck it
in the
trash can
Rubbish underfoot may mean fire overhead

© BETHLEHEM STEEL COMPANY
```

[← Children Bear the Promise of a Better World](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/children-bear-the-promise-1941/) [Civilian-soldiers, don't let MacArthur down! →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/civilian-soldiers-dont-let-macarthur-down-1941/)

## More propaganda examples that use the same techniques

- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (Dutch Republic · 1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Engraving of a hanged, bare-breasted Taino woman, burning huts and people being killed by Spanish soldiers.
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Kingdom of Great Britain · Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Proclamation de Sonthonax en créole, Cap-Français (Proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax in Creole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sonthonax-proclamation-creole-1793/) (France · Aug 29, 1793 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating). Content note: Colonial-era proclamation on slavery and emancipation in Saint-Domingue; speaks of slaves, whips and 'Nègues' in period terms.
- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
- [Brolej Žemajčiaj! (Brothers Samogitians!): hand-painted broken-cross poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/brolej-zemajciaj-broken-cross-1862/) (Russian Empire · 1862 · Fear appeal, Transfer)