Skip to main content

Search the Collection

396 results

At Halavo Seaplane Base, Islanders teach black American Seabees (in shirts) how to make thatch for shading cooler barracks.

Ventriloquist and his two charges entertain Marshall Islanders as part of a visit by Marine entertainers.

Four Fais men sort newly acquired American money with advice from U.S. Marines. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

Just one month before being killed by a burst of machine gun fire on a small island off Okinawa, famed war correspondent Ernie Pyle enjoys a happy moment with local children.

The color guard of the Samoan Fita Fita Guard stand in front of their barracks.

Local coastwatchers on guard at their post overlooking Noumea harbor receive a visit from a "liberty party" of sailors from the USS Enterprise.

Major C. V. Widdy, chief manager for Levers Pacific Plantations before the war, gives a potential labor corps recruit a cursory medical examination

Handling and stowage of gasoline on Guadalcanal. Natives unloading drums from barge.

Island mess cook peels potatos [sic]

Two young Islanders wait on table in a military mess. One serviceman pours out a dose of Quinine Sulfate

After the Americans recaptured the island, a Pharmacists Mate treats the infected hand of a young Chamorro girl in a Navy dispensary constructed of local material

The war directed medical attention to several endemic Pacific diseases, especially yaws and malaria. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

Navy nurses give a yaws injection to a Micronesian child. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

New public health measures were developed during the war to reduce massive troop casualties from malaria. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

Gift-giving druing the war flowed two ways, and many Islanders recall the presents they gave to Allied and Japanese servicemen. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

In return, "in the name of Admiral Nimitz," the Naval officeres present Islanders with a pile of military supplies including cigarettes, cigars, spools of thread, knives, and caramel candy.

Naptali Bea (left) and Ben Avualvulu (right) enjoy "C" ration biscuits given to them by U.S. troops. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

Tongans sail out to the USS Enterprise to sell or trade beads, shells, grass skirts, and mats to the sailors.

Islanders and sailors from the USS Nicholas exchange grass skirts for cigarettes. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

Members of the Fijian 3rd Battalion, dressed in traditional dance costume, honor officers of the Allied forces with a kava (yaqona) ceremony. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

Fais Islanders try out a new custom: saluting the American flag. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

On behalf of Solomon Islanders, Jacob Vouza of the Solomon Islandes Defence Force, and honorary Sergeant Major in the U.S. Marine Corps, presents a plaque of gratitude to the commander of U.S. forces on the island. [See "more images" below for complete caption]

An American Catholic priest, standing next to a makeshift altar set up on the bech to give a prayer service, presents a young Micronesian girl with a rosary.

Island images of military outsiders were shaped by American films and magazines that flooded the Pacific during the war. [See "more images" below for complete caption]