Take your place in the ranks
Army recruiting poster for skilled tradesmen: a single sergeant carrying a wrench walks out of a tinted photograph of a marching column of helmeted soldiers. The ranks behind imply many have already joined and the single worker is invited to step in beside them (bandwagon, with a plain-folks tradesman figure).
Propaganda techniques used in this poster
- Date
- 1942
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- U.S. Army, Recruiting Publicity Bureau
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- Military
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Recruit
- Themes
- War and the military, Labor
- 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. Army, Recruiting Publicity Bureau. National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44, 44-PA-253 (NAID 513695).
Text on the object
take YOUR place in the ranks MAKE YOUR WORK TOOLS FIGHTING TOOLS. THE ARMY NEEDS MANY SKILLED CRAFTSMEN NOW FOR THE SIGNAL CORPS, THE ORDNANCE DEPARTMENT, and THE AIR FORCES U.S.ARMY RECRUITING AND INDUCTION SERVICE [imprint: P-48-RPB 9-16-42 10M]
