Bringing entertainment to a rapidly moving front
During the Second World War the United Service Organizations and Army's Special Services brought entertainment to American servicemen and women in both the United States and overseas from isolated outposts to military bases near the front lines. However, in late 1944 the American military was advancing through Western Europe so fast that entertainment units could not keep up with them [1] .
The United Service Organizations Inc. (USO) is a nonprofit-charitable corporation that provides live entertainment, such as comedians, actors and musicians, social facilities, and other programs to members of the United States Armed Forces and their families. Since 1941, it has worked in partnership with the Department of War, and later with the Department of Defense (DoD), relying heavily on private contributions and on funds, goods, and services from various corporate and individual donors. Although it is congressionally-chartered, it is not a government agency.
Special Services was the entertainment branch of the American military. The unit was created on 22 July 1940 by the War Department as part of the Army Service Forces. Special Services not only used their own specially trained and talented troops but also would often engage local performers.
Major Joshua Logan then an officer in Special Services noted that the advancing G.I.s were "never in one place long enough to see a show". He was credited with coming up with the idea of small quick moving entertainment units to entertain at rapid notice [2] called "jeep shows".
Joshua Lockwood Logan III was an American stage and film director and writer.
G.I. are initials used to describe the soldiers of the United States Army and airmen of the United States Army Air Forces and also for general items of their equipment. The term G.I. has been used as an initialism of "Government Issue" or "General Issue", but it originally referred to "galvanized iron", as used by the logistics services of the United States Armed Forces.
A jeep show consisted of three unarmed soldier entertainers, often including a serving soldier who had been a well known celebrity from Broadway, Hollywood, the Golden Age of Radio or club entertainment such as Mickey Rooney, Bobby Breen and Red Buttons. The small troupe usually comprised a comedian, dancer/singer and musician. They traveled in a jeep with their musical instruments and other equipment carried in a quarter ton trailer that would be converted into a stage. They broadcast their show through a public address system using the jeep's battery. Each show lasted an average of 45 minutes and troupes could be combined into nine or 18 man shows for larger shows. [3] The jeep show troops carried easily transportable musical instruments such as guitars, saxophones, banjos, accordions and drums. The troupe presented songs, skit, jokes, dancing, and pantomime [4]
Broadway theatre, commonly known as Broadway, refers to the theatrical performances presented in the 41 professional theatres, each with 500 or more seats located in the Theater District and Lincoln Center along Broadway, in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Along with London's West End theatre, Broadway theatre is widely considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre in the English-speaking world.
The cinema of the United States, often metonymously referred to as Hollywood, has had a large effect on the film industry in general since the early 20th century. The dominant style of American cinema is classical Hollywood cinema, which developed from 1917 to 1960 and characterizes most films made there to this day. While Frenchmen Auguste and Louis Lumière are generally credited with the birth of modern cinema, American cinema soon came to be a dominant force in the industry as it emerged. It produces the total largest number of films of any single-language national cinema, with more than 700 English-language films released on average every year. While the national cinemas of the United Kingdom (299), Canada (206), Australia, and New Zealand also produce films in the same language, they are not considered part of the Hollywood system. Hollywood has also been considered a transnational cinema. Classical Hollywood produced multiple language versions of some titles, often in Spanish or French. Contemporary Hollywood offshores production to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
The old-time radio era, sometimes referred to as the Golden Age of Radio, was an era of radio programming in the United States during which radio was the dominant electronic home entertainment medium. It began with the birth of commercial radio broadcasting in the early 1920s and lasted through the 1940s, when television gradually superseded radio as the medium of choice for scripted programming, variety and dramatic shows.
Rooney recalled his first show being between two Sherman tanks three miles from the front in Belgium for 60 soldiers. Rooney's troupe sometimes put on seven shows a day and covered 150,000 miles in a year [5] ,
One unit of 54 men served the Western European front, another unit of 15 men served in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations [6] .
The Mediterranean Theater of Operations, United States Army (MTOUSA), originally called the North African Theater of Operations (NATOUSA), was the American term for the theater of operations covering North Africa and Italy during World War II. American operations in the theater began with the Allied Expeditionary Force, which landed on the beaches of northwest Africa on November 8, 1942, in Operation Torch. They ended in the Italian Alps some 31 months later with the German surrender in May 1945.
Before Victory in Europe Day the jeep shows played before 23,749 troops in eighty-one performances [7] .
Operation Dragoon was the code name for the Allied invasion of the French Riviera. Originally planned to coincide with D-Day, it had been postponed due to insufficient landing-craft. In August, it was revived, as the zone had become a low priority for the Germans, and conditions looked favourable for the liberation of Southern France with its key ports of Marseille and Toulon.
The American Expeditionary Forces was a formation of the United States Army on the Western Front of World War I. The AEF was established on July 5, 1917, in France under the command of Gen. John J. Pershing. It fought alongside French Army, British Army, Canadian Army, and Australian Army units against the German Empire. A minority of the AEF troops also fought alongside Italian Army units in that same year against the Austro-Hungarian Army. The AEF helped the French Army on the Western Front during the Aisne Offensive in the summer of 1918, and fought its major actions in the Battle of Saint-Mihiel and the Meuse-Argonne Offensive in the latter part of 1918.
Operation Archway was the codename for one of the largest and most diverse operations carried out by the Special Air Service during the Second World War.
The Italian Campaign of World War II consisted of Allied operations in and around Italy, from 1943 to 1945. The Joint Allied Forces Headquarters (AFHQ) was operationally responsible for all Allied land forces in the Mediterranean theatre and it planned and led the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, followed in September by the invasion of the Italian mainland and the campaign in Italy until the surrender of the German Armed Forces in Italy in May 1945.
The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of conflict between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union (U.S.S.R.), Poland and other Allies, which encompassed Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Northeast Europe (Baltics), and Southeast Europe (Balkans) from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945. It has been known as the Great Patriotic War in the former Soviet Union and modern Russia, while in Germany it was called the Eastern Front, or the German-Soviet War by outside parties.
Popski's Private Army, officially No. 1 Demolition Squadron, PPA, was a unit of British Special Forces set up in Cairo in October 1942 by Major Vladimir Peniakoff. Popski's Private Army was one of several raiding units formed in the Western Desert during the Second World War. The squadron also served in Italy, and was disbanded in September 1945.
The Allied advance from Paris to the Rhine, also known as the Siegfried Line Campaign, was a phase in the Western European Campaign of World War II.
Case Blue was the German Armed Forces' name for its plan for the 1942 strategic summer offensive in southern Russia between 28 June and 24 November 1942, during World War II.
The Transportation Corps was established 31 July 1942 by Executive Order 9082. The Transportation Corps is a combat service support branch of the U.S. Army, and was headquartered at Fort Eustis, Virginia, but moved to Fort Lee, Virginia in 2010. It is also one of three U.S. Army logistics branches, the others being the Quartermaster Corps and the Ordnance Corps. The Transportation Corps is responsible for the movement of personnel and material by truck, rail, air, and sea. Its motto is "Spearhead of Logistics," and it is currently the third smallest branch of the Army.
The Willys MB and the Ford GPW, both formally called the U.S. Army "Truck, 1⁄4-ton, 4×4, Command Reconnaissance", commonly known as Jeep or jeep, and sometimes referred to as G503, were highly successful off-road capable, light, military utility vehicles, built in large numbers to a standardized design, from 1941 to 1945, for the Allied forces in World War II.
The Battle for Brest was fought on the Western Front during World War II. Part of the Allied plan for the invasion of mainland Europe called for the capture of port facilities, in order to ensure the timely delivery of the enormous amount of war materiel required to supply the invading Allied forces. It was estimated that the 37 Allied divisions to be on the continent by September 1944 would need 26,000 tons of supplies each day. The main port the Allied forces hoped to seize and put into their service was Brest, in northwestern France.
The Ghost Army was a United States Army tactical deception unit during World War II officially known as the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops. The 1,100-man unit was given a unique mission within the Allied Army: to impersonate other Allied Army units to deceive the enemy. From a few months after D-Day, when they landed in France, until the end of the war, they put on a "traveling road show" utilizing inflatable tanks, sound trucks, fake radio transmissions, scripts and pretence. They staged more than 20 battlefield deceptions, often operating very close to the front lines. Their story was kept secret for more than 40 years after the war, and elements of it remain classified. The unit was the subject of a PBS documentary The Ghost Army in 2013.
Military light utility vehicle, or within military context or parlance just Light Utility Vehicle (LUV), is a term sometimes used for the lightest weight class military vehicle category. In popular terms, what is intended is a
jeep-like, typically four-wheel drive vehicle for military use. They are by definition lighter than other military trucks and vehicles, inherently compact and usually unarmored, with short body overhangs for nimble all-terrain mobility, and frequently around 4 passenger capacity.
The 106th Cavalry Regiment was a mechanized cavalry unit of the United States Army in World War II recognized for its outstanding action. The group was organized in 1921 as part of the Illinois National Guard and during the Spanish–American War and World War I was known as the 1st Regiment Illinois Volunteer Cavalry. It underwent a number of reorganizations before World War II. Like other Guard units during the inter-war years, the 106th held monthly drills and yearly training. Readiness for war in 1940 led to the mechanization of the unit and induction into Federal Service at Camp Livingston, Louisiana on 25 November 1940.
The United States Army Central, formerly the Third United States Army, commonly referred to as the Third Army and as ARCENT is a military formation of the United States Army, which saw service in World War I and World War II, in the 1991 Gulf War, and in the coalition occupation of Iraq. It is best known for its campaigns in World War II under the command of General George S. Patton.
The Demobilization of United States armed forces after the Second World War began with the defeat of Germany in May 1945 and continued through 1946. The United States had more than 12 million men and women in the armed forces at the end of World War II of whom 7.6 million were stationed abroad. The American public demanded a rapid demobilization and soldiers protested the slowness of the process. Military personnel were returned to the United States in Operation Magic Carpet. By June 30, 1947, the number of active duty soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen in the armed forces had been reduced to 1,566,000.
