Fats Help Make Gunpowder
Photo-panel sheet headed 'Fats Help Make Gunpowder', with five captioned photographs from a kitchen to a demolition blast and a 'Where fat goes' conversion table. Film actress Janet Blair is shown ladling fat, lending a celebrity's name to the chore (transfer); the pound-for-pound figures present only the favourable chain from fat to explosives (card-stacking).
Propaganda techniques used in this poster
- Date
- 1941
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- Office of War Information (issuer not printed)
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- State
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Mobilize or secure compliance
- Themes
- Home front, Science and technology
- Event
- World War II
- Regime
- Roosevelt administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44, World War II Posters, retrieved October 4, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (U.S. government work)
Office of War Information (issuer not printed). National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44, 44-PA-753 (NAID 514240).
Text on the object
FATS HELP MAKE GUNPOWDER a tablespoon each day from your kitchen will crush the Axis MOVIE STAR JANET BLAIR LADLES EXTRA FAT FROM THE ROASTING PAN. While edible fats should give all possible nutrition before going to war, some can be taken from the pan before making gravy. To meet war needs, every housewife must save one tablspoonful of fat each day. TAKE THE FAT TO YOUR BUTCHER. Butchers all over the country are accepting household fats and greases which they will turn over to local rendering plants for conversion into glycerine. They will pay you for each pound of fat the price established by the official collection agency. THE SOAP MAKER EXTRACTS THE GLYCERINE. Glycerine results from a soap making process. Glycerine makes explosives and camouflage paints. In this giant soap kettle fats become soap. When salt is added, the liquid part of this mixture will drop to the bottom of the kettle. That liquid, in the hands of chemists, becomes glycerine. ACIDS TRANSFORM GLYCERINE INTO NITROGLYCERINE. When nitric and sulphuric acids are added to glycerine it becomes deadly nitroglycerine for explosives. When glycerine is allocated to one of our allies, it is usually shipped in its harmless state. DEAD ANIMAL FATS ARE USEFUL Renderers in the rural areas are prepared to process fats from dead farm animals. Your government needs this fat. You are urged to contact your nearest renderer to remove dead animals. WHERE FAT GOES One pound of waste fats equals 1/10 of a pound of glycerine. 1/10 of a pound of glycerine equals 1/5 of a pound of nitroglycerine. 1/5 of a pound of nitro-glycerine equals 1.3 pounds of gunpowder. 1/5 of a pound of nitro-glycerine equals 1/2 of a pound of dynamite. 50 pounds of waste cooking fats equals 5 pounds of glycerine, or enough to manufacture synthetic resin sufficient to produce enough camouflage to cover one medium tank. WASTE FATS HELP CAUSE THIS EXPLOSION. This demolition charge would have blown out a section of railroad track if it had been set under the rails instead of in a bank of earth during maneuvers. A Marine demolition squad in training at the New River, N. C. base goes through the full routine of destroying a strategic railway line.
