Articles tagged as World War II | Smithsonian Magazine

This image, entitled "Doing Their Share, Too," celebrated the war work of black women.

Cool Finds

This African American Artist’s Cartoons Helped Win World War II

Charles Alston knew how to turn art into motivation

February 27, 2017

This animal hair toothbrush (horse hair, to be exact) is said to have belonged to Napoleon Bonaparte.

You Can Still Buy Pig-Hair Toothbrushes

There’s an argument for it, given all the environmental destruction causes by plastic ones

February 24, 2017

Tootsie Rolls contain small amounts of cocoa and also an ingredient you might not expect—orange extract.

Tootsie Rolls Were WWII Energy Bars

The candies were included in rations because they stayed fresh for a long time

February 23, 2017

Dachau's gate had a chilling message for its inmates.

The identity of the thieves remains a mystery

February 22, 2017

Hans Scholl, Sophie Scholl and Christoph Probst (pictured, left to right, in 1942) resisted the Nazis as members of the White Rose, a secret student group.

The White Rose was short-lived, but its words were hard to ignore

February 22, 2017

Aleutian people stand on the deck of a ship forcibly evacuating them to southeastern Alaska.

In the name of safety, Aleuts were held against their will under intolerable conditions in internment camps

February 22, 2017

Hitler used the Reichstag fire in 1933 to seize almost unlimited power.

History of Now

The True Story of the Reichstag Fire and the Nazi Rise to Power

When the German parliamentary building went up in flames, Hitler harnessed the incident to seize power

February 21, 2017

A proposed museum in the former Jewish ghetto in Vilnius, Lithuania, features portraits of families who once lived there.

The Holocaust’s Great Escape

A remarkable discovery in Lithuania brings a legendary tale of survival back to life

March 2017

A Daring Rescue-by-Submarine, Deep in Enemy Waters

When a WWII Australian spy operation in occupied Borneo is uncovered, its operatives go into hiding. Rescuing them involves sneaking a sub into enemy water

February 20, 2017

British statesman and author Winston Churchill reads correspondence at his desk in 1933.

Think Big

“Are We Alone in the Universe?” Winston Churchill’s Lost Extraterrestrial Essay Says No

The famed British statesman approached the question of alien life with a scientist’s mind

February 16, 2017

After the ship exploded in New York Harbor in 1944, 136 sailors were classified as missing, but new research suggests some were buried on Long Island

February 15, 2017

Romanians protest in Victoria Place in Bucharest on January 22.

Up to half a million citizens protested a new decree that would have diminished anti-corruption penalties

February 7, 2017

Vera Lynn performing a lunchtime concert at a munitions factory in 1941.

WWII Songstress Croons Her Way to Age 100 With a New Album

Dame Vera Lynn “the Forces’ Sweetheart” will make the history books with the release

February 2, 2017

Italian-Americans were placed under suspicion when the United States entered World War II.

During World War II, the U.S. Saw Italian-Americans as a Threat to Homeland Security

The executive order that forced Japanese-Americans from their homes also put immigrants from Italy under the watchful eye of the government

February 2, 2017

A guard tower at Auschwitz-Birkenau, where tens of thousands were murdered.

New database lays out details of the SS guards and commanders who carried out some of history’s most terrible crimes

Updated: February 1, 2017 | Originally Published: January 31, 2017

One of the Last Links to the Inner Nazi Circle Dies at 106

Brunhilde Pomsel worked with Joseph Goebbels until the final days of the Third Reich

January 30, 2017

President Clinton presents Fred Korematsu with a Presidential Medal of Freedom during a ceremony at the White House Thursday, Jan. 15, 1998. Korematsu's legal challenges to civilian exclusion orders during World War II helped spur the redress movement for Japanese-Americans.

Fred Korematsu Fought Against Japanese Internment in the Supreme Court… and Lost

Nearly 75 years later, the infamous decision has yet to be overturned

January 30, 2017

There are few images of the top-secret map room. This one, taken at the end of WWII, shows Army Chief Warrant Officer Albert Cornelius standing before a map of Europe.

Take a Rare Look Inside FDR’s WWII Information Center: The Map Room

Long before Google Earth, this was how the president saw the world

January 30, 2017

German-Jewish refugees are shown at the rail of the German Liner St. Louis in Havana Cuba on June 1, 1939.

In 1939, Cuba and the United States turned back a ship full of German Jews, 254 of whom were later killed during the Holocaust

January 27, 2017

Trapped between nationalism and documentation, a Polish museum grapples with how to tell its story

January 25, 2017