Message to Hitler: There’d be devil to pay if he came up against tanks made in York, Pa.
This York Corporation worker had a little fun painting a devil’s mask on his hood. (To view the face behind the desk, see photo below.) Background posts: ‘Little Johnny’ called for Allies in World War II and The bomb: ‘And yet it stopped the war’ and Nazis murdered downed airman from York County, Part IIII.
York’s George Anderson made America laugh during the dark days of World War II.
He donned a York Corporation welder’s hood bearing a devil’s face.
And someone snapped a photo.
The image then appeared in about 700 U.S. newspapers during the war… .
Yorkco’s George Anderson emerges from behind the hood.
‘When I painted that face on my hood, I never expected that it would get so much publicity,’ Anderson told “Shop News,” Yorkco’s newsletter.
I subsquently picked up the photos from the newsletter for use in my York County WW II book “In the Thick of the Fight.”
And George Anderson’s obituary appearing in the York Daily Record today (2/3/08) mentions that he was profiled in the book. It further explained that the painted hood was designed to remind Hitler “that there would be the devil to pay if he came up against any of the tanks made and sent from York, PA!”
Anderson, a bit of a Renaissance man and with a sense of humor that made him popular with kids, retired as a barber. He could sing, dance and play the violin. He was a skilled photographer, too.
His obituary looped back to his welding skills.
His backyard was known as “The Desert.” Grass did not have a chance there. According to his obituary, his welding skills came into play in making any kind of playground equipment children could want.
To them, he was an angel.
For numerous posts on York Corporation’s – now Johnson Controls’ – role in World War II, click here.
