Description
Anti-dictatorship, pro-free business poster featuring a man chained to a post for the Think American Institute. The Think American Institute was formed by a group of industrialists from Rochester, New York, to combat subversive propaganda they felt was infiltrating American business. The group aimed to preserve the social order, boost American morale, extend the institutions of American freedom, and aid the war effort after the U.S. entry into World War II.
The Think American Series ran from 1939 to the early 1960s, and produced weekly posters with illustrated messages that were placed in financial, business, and educational organizations across America. The series produced over 300 poster designs during the war and more than 1,000 overall, with the majority conceived by Miller.
A main theme of the series was the association of individual freedom with freedom of industry. During the war, this subtext was used to link Axis dictatorships to the subjugation of their citizens through the nationalization of business. The success of American private industry not only provided the tools to fight the war, but it also was an antithesis to Axis ideology.
Author — Chester Raymond Miller.
