!['Conservando os Mares Livres' [Keeping the Seas Free], 1942 US poster: A photograph of a US battleship firing its main guns](../images/us-owi-ensuring-freedom-of-the-seas-portuguese-1942.jpg)
'Conservando os Mares Livres' [Keeping the Seas Free] (Ensuring Freedom of the Seas [Portuguese])
A photograph of a US battleship firing its main guns, with smoke and crew in the foreground, sits above a Portuguese text block, a US flag and a portrait of President Roosevelt, inside a blue border of stars. The headline puts the virtue phrase 'free seas' over a warship firing (glittering generalities), the flag and portrait lend authority (transfer), and the text gives only US ship counts and costs (card-stacking).
Propaganda techniques used in this poster
- Date
- 1942
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- Office of War Information (NARA RG 44 series; issuer not printed on the sheet)
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- State
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Foreign public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Theme
- 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 Foreign Posters, retrieved October 3, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (U.S. government work, NARA RG 44 OWI series)
Office of War Information, 1942-1945. National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44 (NAID 44268447, 44-PF-R-5e).
Text on the object
CONSERVANDO OS MARES LIVRES Os canhões de 16 polegadas do couraçado “North Carolina” recentemente incorporado na esquadra, estão lançando projéteis de uma tonelada, a 42 quilómetros de distância, na fotografia que aí se vê. Êste navio do custo de 1,625,000,000 escudos, é um dos cinco recentemente lançados à água, e não há outro que o iguale em couraça e potência de fogo. Com 343 navios de combate em atividade, e 345 em construção, a Marinha dos Estados Unidos está em condições de fazer face a tôda e qualquer tentativa das nações agressoras, no sentido de fechar ao mundo a passagem dos mares. PRESIDENTE ROOSEVELT
KEEPING THE SEAS FREE The 16-inch guns of the battleship “North Carolina”, recently commissioned into the fleet, are firing one-ton projectiles at a distance of 42 kilometres in the photograph seen here. This ship, costing 1,625,000,000 escudos, is one of five recently launched, and there is no other that equals it in armour and firepower. With 343 combat ships in service and 345 under construction, the United States Navy is in a position to face any and every attempt by the aggressor nations to close the passage of the seas to the world. PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT
