World War II Rumor Project collection, 1942-1943

Title Page | Collection Summary | Biographical/Organizational Note | Scope and Content | Arrangement

Collection Summary

Title	World War II Rumor Project collection, 1942-1943
Inclusive Dates	1942-1943
Call No.	AFC 1945/001
Creator	United States. Office of War Information
Extent (whole collection)	approximately 8,000 items
Extent (whole collection)	10 boxes (5 linear feet)
Extent (manuscripts)	141 folders (approx. 8,000 sheets)
Extent (graphic materials)	12 drawings and cartoons : graphite pencil, blue ink, newsprint
Language	Collection material in English
Location	American Folklife Center, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Finding Aid Permalink	Cite or bookmark this finding aid as: https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.afc/eadafc.af010004
LCCN Permalink	LC Catalog record: https://lccn.loc.gov/2004695194
Summary	Manuscript collection created by the Office of War Information in 1942-1943. Field representatives of various federal agencies in 42 states enlisted individuals who collected rumors generated in the United States during World War II. These individuals or "correspondents" included dentists, beauty shop operators, policemen, proprietors, and librarians who had access to rumors in their communities. Reports were submitted to Dr. Eugene Horowitz at the Bureau of Public Inquiries of OWI, who organized the materials. Rumors, jokes, rhymes, and anecdotes about the war were also collected by teachers from African American and white high school and college students; a few drawings and cartoons are included with the submissions from students.
Online Content	The World War II Rumor Project collection is digitized, and images are available to view on the Library of Congress website at https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.afc/collafc.afc1945001. The collection was transcribed as part of the Library of Congress crowdsourcing program By the People (https://crowd.loc.gov) in a campaign called "Information and Disinformation: The World War II Rumor Project." The transcription dataset is available on the Library of Congress website at https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.gdc/gdcdatasets.2022360466. It contains text created by volunteers through a transcription and review process, volunteer-created tags, digital collections metadata, and metadata representing the arrangement of the items in the By the People platform, Concordia.