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Prepared from the source scan: surroundings removed and the sheet levelled where required. The source record remains available below.
The Posters That Went to War · Over There
First in the Fight, Always Faithful: Be a U.S. Marine!
James Montgomery Flagg (1877-1960) · U.S. Marine Corps recruiting, 1917
Format
Archival pigment giclée on museum-grade matte art paper, color-managed to the source scan — the flat inks and stone grain intact. The 40×60 is the room-changer.
Size
$39.00
What it is
A colour poster James Montgomery Flagg drew for Marine Corps recruiting in 1917, from the copy the Digital Public Library of America holds; the Library of Congress has the same design (LCCN 94507256) in a smaller scan.
Why it matters
Always Faithful is the Corps' motto, Semper Fidelis, put into English for the street. Flagg drew it the year he drew his Uncle Sam for the Army.
What to notice
The two lines of the title, a boast and then the motto, carried over Flagg's Marine.
Semper Fidelis, translated for the recruiting office.
Provenance
- School
- The Great War Poster (United States and the world)
- Designer
- James Montgomery Flagg (1877-1960)
- Campaign
- Enlist
- Service
- Marines
- Format
- Political poster
- Poster published
- U.S. Marine Corps recruiting, 1917
- Source
- Missouri Historical Society, via DPLA and Wikimedia Commons
Rights: CLEAR. Public domain — U.S. 95-year rule (published 1930 or earlier). Gated by the poster’s own publication year. Cleared by registry on 2026-11-02. Commons licence re-read 2026-11-02: No restrictions. LicenseShortName is "No restrictions" with the DPLA cooperation template rather than a PD template; cleared here on publication in the United States before 1931 under the war brief. Flagg died in 1960: in life-plus-70 countries the work stays protected until 1 January 2031; legal sign-off owed before any EU or UK order (the Dudovich precedent).
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