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Anti-Communist Propaganda Posters From 1950’s Detroit


July 17, 2014 | Sophie Weiner

In these 1952 propaganda posters we see the now-defunct Detroit manufacturer Bohn Aluminum and Brass Corporation try to convince their employees that their unionizing was the beginnings of the country’s fall to communism.

Their eerie disembodied hands (perhaps, the invisible hand of the market?) are juxtaposed with equally creepy, bad puns. A caption near a chessboard reads, “Every Red move is calculated to checkmate freedom.” A thumb sticking out, horizontally, not vertically, advises that “the Reds hitchhike on freedom,” whatever that means.

Cool-looking as the posters may be, Communism triumphed Detroit proletariat continued to occupy factory floors and stage “sit-down strikes with over 12,000 workers.” (Images: Dangerous Minds)