I'm building the ships we need to win!
Maritime Commission shipyard poster: a smiling welder in cap and pushed-up goggles looks out from the sheet with a 'Ships for Victory' badge on his collar and slipways behind him. The unnamed worker speaks in the first person (plain-folks); the quotation reads "I'm building the ships we need to win!" and the badge links his job to the war effort.
Propaganda techniques used in this poster
- Date
- 1941
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- U.S. Maritime Commission
- 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, Labor, War and the military
- 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)
U.S. Maritime Commission. National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44, 44-PA-1076 (NAID 514603).
Text on the object
"I'm building the ships we need to win!" SHIPS FOR VICTORY [signature: Norton (partly legible)] U.S. MARITIME COMMISSION
