'The Big Picture' depicts the life of U.S. General Dwight D Eisenhower. Sergeant Stuart Queen of the U.S. Army stands in front of a map. He gives an introduction of Eisenhower. In 1945 Eisenhower returns to his homeland in Denison, Texas. A banner reads 'Welcome IKE'. People gather on the sides of the streets to welcome him. He waves from an open car at the cheering crowds. People at parade carry the U.S. flags during a ceremony. Eisenhower salutes. D Day, June 6, 1944- Barges carrying American troops land on the shore of Normandy. Eisenhower with another military officer. Eisenhower salutes. Streets of the city Abilene. Exterior of the Eisenhower Museum. Two boys enter the museum. Pictures of Eisenhower in his childhood - during infancy, house in which he was born, Eisenhower with a group of children, Eisenhower with his family, with his baseball and football team. View of Eisenhower's bedroom- scripture readings on the walls and books in the shelves. A truck passes the creamery where Eisenhower worked in his spare time. Pictures of Eisenhower leaving home to join the Military Academy at West Point. Cadets marching at the grounds of the military academy. Graduation Certificate of Eisenhower. Eisenhower with his wife Mamie Geneva Doud. Fight in Western Europe during the World War I. Picture of Eisenhower with other cadets. The certificate of the Distinguished Service Medal presented to Eisenhower for his services for training tank crews in Pennsylvania.
Allied tank and tank destroyer firing and Allied infantry in Germany during World War 2. British, American, and Soviet troops escorting German Prisoners of war at the end of the War. Animated map shows line where U.S. and Russian troops met and zones of occupation in Germany and Berlin. It depicts routs of access into the Soviet zone of Berlin View from a vehicle driving through utterly destroyed part of Germany in 1945 with rubble and ruin of many buildings seen. Desperate German citizens facing shortages of food and necessities after the war, cooking on outdoor fire in a city street, and trying to clear some debris of destroyed buildings by hand and using buckets in a "bucket brigade." Bus service being restored and German citizens boarding. Vehicle traffic moving with a German police officer directing. Doctors perform physical examination of a German boy as a group of German boys wait in queue for examination. Soviet Leader, Joseph Stalin, with U.S. President, Harry Truman, British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, at the Potsdam Conference. Children receiving soup at a school in Berlin. Animated map shows routes through the Soviet occupation zone, used by Western Allies, to supply essential food and supplies through the Soviet zone of occupation to sustain West Berlin residents. It then depicts Soviet action blockading the road and rail routes to isolate West Berlin. Views of empty roads, rails, and canals. A DC-3 (US Air Force C-47) transport aircraft taking off. Men loading supplies on aircraft for delivery to West Berlin. A C-54 transport airplane taking off. A British Short S.25 Sunderland flying boat carrying cargo in the Berlin Airlift. Troops carrying supplies for airlift. A British Avro York transport aircraft taking off. A warehouse filled with barrels for Berlin. View from overflying airplane. Trucks resuming travel to Berlin after the Soviets finally lift the 9-month blockade. Normal supplies of food seen again, in West Berlin shops. Vehicle stopped at a checkpoint. Sign warning that: "You are leaving the American Sector." and similar ones at the French and British sector borders. Old road sign pointing to Potsdam, beside another sign warning of entering the Russian zone. Traffic moving between East and West Berlin.
Man securing Moose antlers for display on a former homsteader's log cabin, maintained for airmen's recreational use at Elmendorf Air Force Base (now Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska). He fastens the antlers below another set fastened near the cabin roof. Another take of the same event. Snow visible on roof of the cabin. (Note:The land for Fort Richardson and Elmendorf was purchased by the U.S. Federal Government, from private landowners and homesteaders during 1939 through 1945.)
U.S. Army training film titled 'Here is Germany'. Circa 1930 - 1938 views of pre-war German countryside, and German cities including Berlin and others before destruction in World War 2. Shots include famous German landmarks and buildings in major cities including Brandenburg Gate and Victory Column sculpture close-ups and other monuments all before bombing of World War II. Lifestyle of German people with families and children in their routine lives in the decade of 1930 before the war. Farmers working fields, mined coal transported by rail, potatoes poured from a full sack, a boy shepherd with geese; a farmer counting pigs descending a ramp at a farm. City port or harbor scene with ships and a modern looking railroad train arriving at a station, sign on side reads Deutsche Reichsbahn (German Reich Railway). High speed highway roads like the Autobahn. German cruise ship at sea. Aerial view of airport with "Berlin" sign on ground. German schools, offices, factories and markets. German woman braiding a girl's hair. German woman taking in washed clothing from a clothesline. German men, women, and children cleaning and polishing work areas and possessions. A German library with people studying and others at book shelves. German classroom with a teacher instructing children and writing on a blackboard. Scenes of German musicians and symphony orchestra and musical instruments, artisans, masons, cooks. Busy roads with cars. Narrator then presents a darker other side, showing an arms factory during rearmament of Germany, German soldiers escorting away a religious priest. German military officials. Scenes circa 1945 of victims of German armies and of the concentration camps. Lumps of dead bodies from massive public shootings, a man being tortured, burning chambers, prisoners of war, concentration camps, human ovens, gas chambers. Survivors of the German custody in relief camps of Red Cross. Evidence of atrocities committed by Nazi Germany. Articles made of human skin and bones. Daily utility items like toys and brushes made from human body parts. Scenes of survivors of concentration camps. Polish people dead from Nazi atrocities at Lublin Castle. Italians and Belgians murdered by Germans, American POWs murdered by Germans. Scenes return again to 1930s views of peaceful German citizens and German lifestyle juxtaposed with views of German soldiers and military actions in World War 2. Some famous Americans of German roots: Wendell Willkie, Admiral Chester Nimitz, Henry J. Kaiser. Narrator talking about American customs and values. View of two teenage American boy students viewing a housing area and taking notes. One of the teenage boys is African American. Some men gathered at a bar in an American town. A man holding a long fly fishing pole preparing to depart on a fishing trip. Woman neighbors in discussion. Young American women walking down a sidewalk in an American town as a group of American boys watch and admire them.
Formation of U.S Army Air Forces B-24 Liberator bombers, flying over Iwo Jima during World War 2. View from one of the aircraft of Japanese air field below. Nightime view of American anti-aircraft fire directed at Japanese bombers attacking Saipan. Explosions and fire silhouetting American aircraft on Saipan's Isely field during Japanese air raid. Burning U.S. B-29 bombers. Scene changes to Japanese aircraft destroyed on the ground at the air base on Iwo Jima. Bodies of dead Japanese airmen on the air field. Later view of P-51Ds from the 21st Fighter Group at Central Field on Iwo Jima, in the summer of 1945,after the field had been substantially upgraded to allow B-29 operations. A B-29 is seen displaying an "F" tail code. A formation of B-24 Liberator bombers in flight on a bombing raid. Waist gunner inside a B-24 firing at attacking Japanese fighter aircraft. A Japanese fighter going down in flames at night. View from a B-24 of another, off its left wing, flying in formation with its number 3 engine shutdown and propeller feathered. View from B-24 bombing oil facilities at Balikpapan, Borneo. Bombs bursting on the ground. Glimpse of B-24s in formation. Aerial views of bomb bursts carpeting target areas below. Aerial view of B-24s flying above smoke rising rapidly from bombs bursting below. View of bomb craters left below (probably from later reconnaissance flight).
Background information for United States occupation forces in Japan after end of World War II. At start, the film shows sky filled with U.S. Navy airplanes flying in formations. They include Vought F4U Corsair aircraft, among others, and are seen overhead above the Battleship USS Missouri (BBB-63). Closeup of the USS Missouri with her crew in formation on deck wearing dress whites. Next, General Douglas MacArthur is seen and heard speaking from a podium on the Missouri's deck. He invites the representatives of the Emperor of Japan, and the Japanese Government, and the Japanese Imperial headquarters, to sign the instrument of surrender. The date is September 2, 1945, just after the end of World War 2. Closeups of the Japanese delegation, which includes envoys Foreign Minister Mamora Shigemitsu and General Yoshijiro Umezu, and of MacArthur. Japanese Foreign Minister Mamora Shigemitsu sits at a table. Closeups of him signing the surrender document. Change of scene to Japan, where camera pans over many thousands of Japanese people assembled to learn of their fate. Closeups of Japanese soldiers and family members, as Narrator asks how should the U.S. occupying force treat them. View of soldiers in plain non-military uniforms. Views of Japanese responding en masse to a leader, during World War 2. Views of child victims of the war. Closeup of Japanese soldier firing a short barrel light machine gun. Views of Japanese pedestrians including families, most in western dress. Japanese workers in an office. Film shows artists view of one worker's brain, and then many brains, as Narrator refers to need for reorienting Japanese thinking. View of learned wise Japanese leader at a podium. View of a Japanese soldier posed with his sword above the head of a war prisoner. Japanese mother feeding her baby. Closeups of Japanese babies. Closeups of Japanese school age children, in a group, and some doing things in school, and some at a playground. Group of uniformed Japanese students studying the art of Japanese calligraphy. Students doing artwork, studying nature outdoors, and paying attention to a teacher using a black board to explain how to calculate volumes of different shaped vessels. Students in classes of Geography and of geology. Japanese chemists, architects, and lawyers at work. Telephone switchboard operators at work. Electrified train moving on a track.
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