For the Boys: Danny Kaye

Danny Kaye entertains the 5th Marine Division in the South Pacific, 10-25-1945.

For the Boys: Carole Landis

Carole Landis on Armed Forces Radio, London, 1944


Carole Landis signs autographs in North Africa, 1944

For the Boys: Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy wearing her "Bundles for Bluejackets" uniform during World War II. During the war, she put her acting career on hold to do fund raising for the US Navy, work with the Red Cross and travel on numerous War Bond tours.

The "Thin Man" star pours coffee for sailors at Hollywood's Bundles for Bluejackets canteen in 1942.

For the Boys: Frances Langford

with Bob Hope, North Africa, 1943


USO Tour, North Africa, 1943

For the Boys: Marian Anderson

Original Caption: "Marian Anderson, world's greatest contralto, entertains a group of overseas veterans and WACs on [the] stage of the San Antonio Municipal Auditorium." April 11, 1945

Marian Anderson became an important figure in the struggle for black artists to overcome racial prejudice in the United States during the mid twentieth century. In 1939, the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) refused permission for Anderson to sing to an integrated audience in Constitution Hall. Their race-driven refusal placed Anderson into the spotlight of the international community on a level usually only found by high profile celebrities and politicians. With the aid of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, Anderson instead performed a critically acclaimed open-air concert on Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., to a crowd of more than 75,000 people and a radio audience in the millions. She continued to break barriers for black artists in the United States, becoming the first black person, American or otherwise, to perform at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City on January 7, 1955.

Anderson was an important symbol of grace and beauty during the civil rights movement in the 1960s, singing at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. She also worked for several years as a delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Committee and as a "goodwill ambassadress" for the United States Department of State. The recipient of numerous awards and honors, Anderson was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1963, the Kennedy Center Honors in 1978, the National Medal of Arts in 1986, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1991.

Marian Anderson died on April 8, 1993, at age 96

For the Boys: Chili Williams on the Jack Carson Tour

As promised, here is the third installment in our Chili Williams series. (You can see the other two entries here and here) This time, Chili is hanging with Jack Carson and a few thousand of her closest friends in the Southwest Pacific.

Jack Carson introduces Chili Williams


Jack Carson and Chili Williams, the "Polka-Dot Girl"


Jack Carson, Chili Williams, Shirley Gray, Shelly Ryan
and Mary Ann McCarthy


Chili Williams, Shirley Gray, Shelly Ryan
and Mary Ann McCarthy dish up a feast


Chili serves the troops


Chili Williams and Shirley Gray


Jack Carson, Chili Williams, Shirley Gray,
Shelly Ryan and Mary Ann McCarthy


Jack Carson, Chili Williams, Shirley Gray,
Shelly Ryan and Mary Ann McCarthy


Thanks to Marine Bombing Unit Six Thirteen website for these images.

For the Boys: Ingrid Bergman

Ingrid Bergman visits with PFC Alan W. Lukens, France, 1944

For the Boys: Shirley Gray, Shelly Ryan and Mary Ann McCarthy

Shirley Gray, Shelly Ryan and Mary Ann McCarthy play pickup basketball on Kwajalein Atoll


Shelly Ryan poses on a PBYj





Shirley Gray, Shelly Ryan and Mary Ann McCarthy

For the Boys: Boris Karloff

Boris Karloff visits with the men on Kwajalein Island in 1945. Karloff and his troupe performed "Arsenic and Old Lace."

Photograph: U.S, Marine Corps (Courtesy of Frank E. Acker)

For the Boys: Joey Heatherton

Joey Heatherton in Vietnam














USS Ticonderoga

For the Boys: Chili Williams - Training Booklet

We've already met Chili Williams, the Polka Dot Girl, in a previous "for the boys" entry (which you can see here) and I do have some more of her in a Southwest Pacific USO tour with Jack Carson, which I will share in a future post, but I found some cool images that I'm pretty sure must have been part of an Army training booklet that I couldn't resist posting. Enjoy!!!

Images courtesy of the Skylighters website

For the Boys: Hattie McDaniel

(Original Caption) Hattie McDaniel (center), Chairman of the Negro Division of the Hollywood Victory Committee, takes time off from rehearsals to lead a caravan of entertainers and hostesses to Minter Field, for a vaudeville performance and dance for soldiers stationed there. The young lady to the right of Miss McDaniel is Miss Virginia Paris, noted concert singer.

For the Boys: Chili Williams - The Polka Dot Girl

Known as "The Polka Dot Girl," Chili Williams (born Marian Sorenson in 1921) was discovered by a modeling agent in 1943 at Fire Island in New York. The modeling agent's photographer, Ewing Krainin, took her picture while she was frolicking in the Atlantic Ocean surf, and the series of photos appeared in the September 27, 1943 issue of LIFE Magazine. Krainin had stitched together a black-and-white polka-dot dance-set (which would later come to be known as the "bikini") for her. The photos were so well received, that 100,000 fans sent in letters requesting copies, many of which found their way into the hands of homesick GI’s fighting during the final months of World War II. She signed a movie contract in 1944 and moved to Hollywood, California, where she appeared in 17 films, including the wartime favorites Girl Rush (1944), The Falcon In Hollywood (1944), George White's Scandals (1945), Johnny Angel (1945), Wonder Man (1945), and Having A Wonderful Crime (1945). Chili also joined the Jack Carson USO tour of the Pacific Theater during the winter of 1944-45. (Keep your eyes peeled for pictures from that tour in a future "For the Boys" posting)

For the Boys: Dorothy Donegan

Dorothy Donegan, pianist, and the Camp Robert Smalls swing band at NTS, Great Lakes. June 16, 1943

For the Boys: Marlene Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich autographs the cast on the leg of TEC 4 Earl E. McEarland in a U.S. hospital in Belgium (1-24-1944)

For the Boys: Jack Benny's USO Troupe, 1944

In the Southwest Pacific, summer 1944...

Carole Landis


Carole Landis and Jean Brummer arrive on an island base aboard a PBY


Jean Brummer


Martha Tilton


Jack Benney, Larry Adler, Jean Brummer, Martha Tilton and Carole Landis