Content note: Racial caricature of a fanged Japanese figure with a bloodied dagger and a swastika patch, ethnic slur ('Jap') and mock-pidgin speech; an injured worker lies on the floor. This object is shown as it was published. Why
Tokio Kid Say: Oh So Joyful for Mishap (Douglas Aircraft poster)
Under the lettering 'Tokio Kid say', a fanged, bespectacled caricature in a rising-sun cap and a swastika patch on his trousers leans from behind a plant wall holding a bloodied dagger and a pencil, tallying marks beside the speech 'Oh so joyful for mishap - one more less now fighting Jap.' Behind him workers crowd around a fallen man. A workplace accident is billed as the enemy's gain, with his uniform and the mock-pidgin speech carrying the stigma.
- Date
- 1942
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- Douglas Aircraft Company, Inc., Santa Monica ('Tokio Kid' plant-poster series); artist Jack Campbell
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- Corporation
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Themes
- Labor, Home front, Race and ethnicity
- Event
- World War II
- Techniques
- Name-callingTransfer
- 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 (NARA 535321, local id 179-WP-1471), via Wikimedia Commons, retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain in the US (published 1942 without a copyright notice); NARA: No Copyright - United States
U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA 535321, 179-WP-1471)
Text on the object
TOKIO KID SAY- OH SO JOYFUL FOR MISHAP- ONE MORE LESS NOW FIGHTING JAP THANK YOU JACK CAMPBELL ILLUSTRATED PARTS CATALOG W.P. 233 PUB. BY DOUGLAS AIRCRAFT CO., INC., SANTA MONICA, CALIF., U.S.A.
'W.P. 233' and the publisher line are in very small print along the bottom edge; read with reasonable confidence.
