---
title: The Country Needs You to Help Harvest the Cotton
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/the-country-needs-you-to-help-harvest-the-cotton-1918/
description: An elderly farmer in shirtsleeves, hat in hand, looks out of a window onto a white cotton field beneath a large American flag.
section: Collection
---

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3. The Country Needs You to Help Harvest the Cotton

[![The Country Needs You to Help Harvest the Cotton, 1918 US poster: An elderly farmer in shirtsleeves, hat in hand, looks out](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/the-country-needs-you-to-help-harvest-the-cotton-1918.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/the-country-needs-you-to-help-harvest-the-cotton-1918.jpg)

# The Country Needs You to Help Harvest the Cotton

An elderly farmer in shirtsleeves, hat in hand, looks out of a window onto a white cotton field beneath a large American flag, a picking basket at his feet. The text asks office workers to lock their desks and join the harvest. The tell of transfer is the flag filling the window: the national symbol is laid over a request for farm labour.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Transfer](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/transfer/) [Plain folks](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/plain-folks/)

## Text on the object

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

```
THE COUNTRY
NEEDS YOU TO
HELP HARVEST
THE COTTON

LOCK YOUR DESK -- CLOSE YOUR DOOR
AND DO YOUR PART

APPLY to your county agent
or agricultural college

U.S. DEPT. of AGRICULTURE

H. Devitt Welsh
```

The boxed 'D P' monogram at lower right and the artist's signature are printed marks, not slogan text.

[← The Better the Soldier, the Better the Salute](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/the-better-the-soldier-the-better-the-salute-1918/) [The Greatest Crime in Christendom →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/the-greatest-crime-in-christendom-1918/)

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