Columbia Calls poster

American Recruitment

This First World War poster was distributed by the United States War Department to encourage the enlistment of men into the armed forces. It features an image of Columbia, the female personification of the United States, standing on the globe, wearing flowing white robes and coronet of silver stars on her liberty cap, and brandishing the American flag. A poem at the bottom right entitled, 'Columbia Calls' features a small swastika, which is a Hindu symbol of good luck, long life and happiness (prior to being co-opted by the National Socialists in the interwar period).

A patriotic poet and artist

The idea for the poster was conceived by Frances Adams Halsted, who also wrote the poem 'Columbia Calls', and was realised by Vincent Aderente (1880–1941), a painter who specialised in murals. According to an article published in the New York Times on 3 June 3 1917, Mrs Halsted wrote the poem in 1916 when she became convinced that the US would enter into war with Germany. When the United States declared war on Germany on 2 April 1917 she offered both the poem and the image to the War Department to use free of charge. The War Department issued 500,000 copies, the proceeds of which were to go to the 'establishment of a home for the orphans of American soliders and sailors, a work which has been a lifelong interest of Mrs Halsted and to which she is now giving all of her time'.

In a letter of thanks to Mrs Halsted, Adjutant General McCain wrote: 'Kindly accept my congratulations upon the success of your efforts to arouse the patriotic spirit of America to a sense of the obligation imposed by the present grave national crisis.'

British and American Posters in New Zealand

This item is part of a collection of First World War posters sent to New Zealand as examples of British and American wartime propaganda. From 1917-1919, the Dominion Museum (now Te Papa) collected such war material with the help of the New Zealand High Commissioner in London and the Department of Defence. This particular poster arrived with the second batch of posters of over one hundred British and American war posters, sent by the High Commissioner in London via the Department of Internal Affairs in June 1919 and New Zealand War Records Section in London (Department of Defence).

The museum intended to collect and display such objects in a planned national war museum in Wellington which never eventuated. Instead, the museum toured over 100 war posters around New Zealand in the early 1920s in the context of increasing commemoration of the war during peacetime. For many, the posters illustrated important aspects of the war and the history of New Zealand's part in the war. This commemorative function was far removed from their original function to encourage wartime contribution.