{"id":64,"date":"2016-06-18T22:40:04","date_gmt":"2016-06-18T22:40:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/?p=64"},"modified":"2016-07-15T20:07:26","modified_gmt":"2016-07-15T20:07:26","slug":"the-story-of-private-snafu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/2016\/06\/18\/the-story-of-private-snafu\/","title":{"rendered":"The Story of Private Snafu"},"content":{"rendered":"

On December 7, 1941, the USA was unexpectedly plunged into the middle of World War II. There was a lot of panic, confusion and plumb dumb goofs made right from the beginning.<\/p>\n

\"Cooking
Something’s not kosher here<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hollywood to the rescue! The \u201cOffice of War Information\u201d was set up to educate and influence the general public using whatever they could get their hands on \u2013 newspapers, magazines, radio and even comic books. Under the leadership of Brigadier General Frederick Osborn, movies were picked as the best medium, and the enlisted Service men and women as the best target. These new recruits were fresh and full of spirit, but they came from all walks of society, from field hands who could barely read to Captains of Industry used to command.<\/p>\n

\"Private
Farm lads are often out standing in their fields!<\/figcaption><\/figure>Film Director Frank Capra was picked to lead the educational film team. He produced a series of propaganda shorts called, \u201cWhy We Fight\u201d. Eric Knight, the writer who created the fabled film dog \u201cLassie\u201d, added some animated bits to these shorts. Those cartoons got some of the biggest laughs from their audiences, so Capra looked to make a whole new series of cartoons designed to teach raw recruits what to do. Bids were put out to make these, with Walt Disney considered the likeliest winner. However, Disney wanted to keep the rights to any characters created, plus they put in a high bid. Warner Brothers\u2019 animation Producer Leon Schlesinger bid low and won the deal, including keeping the characters in the public domain.<\/p>\n

The cartoons would be short and done in black and white, to keep costs down. Schlesinger used his best talent from the \u201cLooney Tunes\u201d and “Merrie Melodies\u201d staff, with directors Friz Freleng (inspiration for \u201cYosemito Sam\u201d), Chuck Jones, Frank Tashlin and Bob Clampett. The masterful Mel Blanc provided voices. Capra picked Ted Geisel (who would become \u201cDr. Seuss\u201d) as the chief writer. Over the course of the series, others would add their talents.<\/p>\n

\"Snafu_gas_BB\"
A well known rabbit’s cameo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Schlesinger decided to educate by counterexample, and came up with an \u201cEveryman\u201d who did it all wrong due to ignorance and laziness. Private Snafu was introduced in the 1943 \u201cComing!!!\u201d which also explains his name. \u201cSNAFU \u2013 Situation Normal, All \u2026.. Fouled Up\u201d. The first set of cartoons covered basic military topics like rumor control (\u201cRumors\u201d), laziness (\u201cThe Goldbrick\u201d), regular equipment maintenance (\u201cFighting Tools\u201d, \u201cGas\u201d). Keeping military secrets was another theme, with \u201cSpies\u201d and \u201cCensored\u201d. Munro Leaf, who wrote \u201cThe Story of Ferdinand\u201d, also wrote \u201cThe Chowhound\u201d about not wasting food (both stories featuring bulls).<\/p>\n

Because the Snafu cartoons were only intended for an adult male military audience, there were a lot of subtle jokes and nudity. In \u201cThe Home Front\u201d, Ted Geisel put in a joke just to see what the animator would do -\u201c(In Alaska) it was so cold, it would freeze the nuts off a jeep\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"Nuts-off-a-jeep\"<\/p>\n

\u201cBooby Traps\u201d literally included \u2026 a booby trap!<\/p>\n

\"BoobyTrap-camel\"<\/p>\n

The Axis villains are drawn very unfavorably. Germans are big, overweight and dumb. The Japanese are tiny with huge glasses and even bigger teeth. The casual racism of that wartime era is jarring today.<\/p>\n

The Snafu cartoons succeeded because they entertained while delivering their brief lessons on keeping secrets, cleaning gear or mess hall chores. They weren\u2019t preachy, and Snafu sometimes learned his lessons by the end. As the war progressed and an Allied victory became more and more likely, the Snafu cartoons became a little drier. \u201cA Few Quick Facts: Inflation\u201d and \u201cA Few Quick Facts: Fear\u201d were done by the UPA animation studio with a different but still entertaining style. \u201cHot Spots\u201d (by Hanna and Barbera, who started \u201cthe Flintstones\u201d) shows us how to survive in Iran, with its camel melting heat. \u201cIn the Aleutians\u201d looks at the mud, wind and rain of the Alaskan island chain. When the war ended, so did the series \u2013 the last one, \u201cPrivate SNAFU Presents Seaman TARFU\u201d (written by Hank Ketcham, of \u201cDennis the Menace\u201d fame) was never released.<\/p>\n

The Warner studios churned out a new Private Snafu cartoon every month (occasionally with help from a rival studio, like UPA and MGM) through the end of the war. With a total cost of only $300,000, these were some of the cheapest weapons, and certainly among the funniest.<\/p>\n

We hope you enjoy these Private Snafu cartoons!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On December 7, 1941, the USA was unexpectedly plunged into the middle of World War II. There was a lot of panic, confusion and plumb dumb goofs made right from the beginning. Hollywood to the rescue! The \u201cOffice of War Information\u201d was set up to educate and influence the general public using whatever they could … Continue reading The Story of Private Snafu<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83,"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions\/83"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/frostbackcrow.com\/Fun\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}