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Government Salvage Advertisement (1943)

Advertisement titled “Canada Needs 40 Million Pounds of Grease for Explosives” that appeared in L’Écho du St-Maurice on March 11, 1943. The images and text identify four locations where women could deliver grease and bones. The following lines appear at the bottom: “This campaign is for the duration of the war. Department of National War Services, National Salvage Division.”
L’Écho du St-Maurice (March 11, 1943).
Published in the March 11, 1943, edition of L’Écho du St-Maurice, this advertisement from the Department of National War Services explains that 40 million pounds of grease were needed to produce explosives for the Canadian war effort. The female figures indicate that housewives were the campaign’s main audience. It all began in the home, where women were expected to salvage certain materials useful to the army: fabric, paper, metal, glass, rubber, etc. The same went for certain forms of kitchen waste. For instance, bones could be used to produce aircraft adhesives and grease could be used to produce the glycerin needed to manufacture explosives.