Military

The Museum's superb military collections document the history of the men and women of the armed forces of the United States. The collections include ordnance, firearms, and swords; uniforms and insignia; national and military flags and banners; and many other objects.

The strength of the collections lies in their enormous depth. Some 3,000 military small arms and 2,400 civilian firearms document the mechanical and technological history of the infantryman's weapons from the beginning of the gunpowder era to the present. Among the 4,000 swords and knives in the collection are many spectacular presentation pieces. The collections also include Civil War era telegraph equipment, home front artifacts from both world wars, early computers such as ENIAC, Whirlwind, and Sage, and materials carried at antiwar demonstrations.

During World War II, after the breakdown of the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact, the Soviet news agency TASS issued a series of propaganda posters. Topics included anti-Nazi caricatures and Socialist Realist art encouraging the war effort.
Description
During World War II, after the breakdown of the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact, the Soviet news agency TASS issued a series of propaganda posters. Topics included anti-Nazi caricatures and Socialist Realist art encouraging the war effort. Beginning in June 1941, the Union of Soviet Artists established a publishing collective to produce the posters on an almost daily basis. Because they were displayed in the windows of the news agency's Moscow office, they are known as TASS window posters. It is estimated that about 1,500 different posters were produced between 1941 and 1945.
Well-known artists and poets worked on the designs and captions, and most of the posters were produced in limited editions using the stencil process for both graphics and text. Many posters were completed and reproduced within 24 hours, making them very responsive to political issues and war news. Copies were distributed abroad by VOKS, the Soviet Society for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries. Their messages helped present the USSR favorably to its new allies, including the U.S. The Museum has six of these posters received in 1943 through VOKS. Other collections outside Russia include the University of Nottingham in England and Columbia and Cornell universities in the U.S.
TASS window poster No. 514 is a caricature of a Nazi soldier in his underwear carrying his clothes, with another figure at his side. It may be titled "Ragmen," but the point of the satire is not clear from the image.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1942-1943
1942
artist attribution
Lebedev, Vladimir
author
Marshak, Samuel
ID Number
GA.18848
accession number
164567
catalog number
18848
This circular slide rule describes the effects of a nuclear explosion on people. After World War II, scientists at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory prepared a report on forms of damage associated with the explosion of atomic bombs.
Description
This circular slide rule describes the effects of a nuclear explosion on people. After World War II, scientists at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory prepared a report on forms of damage associated with the explosion of atomic bombs. These included physical damage, fire and heat, and nuclear radiation.
With the development of the more powerful hydrogen bomb, physical chemist Samuel Glasstone and his associates prepared an updated report, and published it under the title The Effects of Nuclear Weapons. This information was distributed for use in planning against possible nuclear attack.
From 1962 onward, copies of The Effects of Nuclear Weapons had a pocket containing a Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer. Setting the indices on the front of the instrument for the yield of a nuclear bomb in megatons and the distance of its explosion in miles, scales on the front of the instrument describe changes in atmospheric pressure and winds associated with the blast, as well as cratering and the velocity of window glass.
Charts on the back indicate the initial nuclear radiation and the thermal radiation. Tables indicate the probable medical effects of various doses of radiation, from no illness to severe burns to death. The Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer was developed at the Lovelace Foundation in Albuqueque, New Mexico, for the United States Atomic Energy Commission.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1962
date received
1990
maker
Lovelace Foundation
ID Number
1990.0688.01
accession number
1990.0688
catalog number
1990.0688.01

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