Content note: Dehumanizing caricature of Germans as an ape, implied sexual violence and partial nudity. This object is shown as it was published. Why
Destroy This Mad Brute — Enlist
A rampaging ape wearing a German 'militarism' helmet carries off a half-naked woman while stomping onto American shores holding a club labeled 'kultur.' The enemy is compressed into a single bestial figure so the viewer feels imminent, personal danger rather than weighing the actual war aims.
- Date
- 1917
- Period
- First World War
- Made by
- U.S. Army (recruitment); artist Harry Ryle Hopps
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- Military
- Regime
- Wilson Administration
- Leader
- Woodrow Wilson
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Recruit
- Themes
- War and the military, Home front
- Event
- World War I
- Techniques
- Fear appealScapegoatingTransfer
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Library of Congress (via Wikimedia Commons), retrieved September 25, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (author died 1937; term expired)
Harry Ryle Hopps, 1917. Library of Congress, LC-USZC4-4696.
Text on the object
DESTROY THIS MAD BRUTE MILITARISM [on the ape's helmet] KULTUR [on the club] ENLIST —Copyright Applied for— H. R. Hopps [artist's signature]
A faint diagonal watermark reading approximately 'U.S. ARMY–YOU MARKET...' runs across the lower portion of this particular digitized copy; it is a stock-photo/reproduction watermark added to the scan, not part of the original 1917 poster, and is not transcribed here.
