Jump to Content

Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Great Britain. Ministry of Information propaganda
XX229  
No online items No online items       Request items ↗
View entire collection guide What's This?
Search this collection
Collection Overview
 
Table of contents What's This?
Description
Pamphlets, posters, serial issues, press releases, photographs, and postcards, distributed during World War II.
Background
Formed on September 4th 1939, the day after Britain's declaration of war, the Ministry of Information (MOI) was the central government department responsible for publicity and propaganda in the Second World War. The initial functions of the MOI were threefold: news and press censorship; home publicity; and overseas publicity in Allied and neutral countries. Planning for such an organisation had started in October 1935 under the auspices of the Committee for Imperial Defence, largely conducted in secret; otherwise the government was publicly admitting the inevitability of war. Propaganda was still tainted by the experience of the First World War. In the 'Great War', several different agencies had been responsible for propaganda, except for a brief period when there had been a Department of Information (1917) and a Ministry of Information (1918) Planning for the new MOI was largely organised by volunteers drawn from a wide range of government departments, public bodies and specialist outside organisations. In March 1946, the MOI was dissolved. Its residual functions passed to the Central Office of Information (COI), a central organisation providing common and specialist information services. Source: "The Art of War" The National Archives, Great Britain, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/theartofwar/inf3.htm
Extent
17 manuscript boxes, 1 card file box, 1 oversize folder (7.8 Linear Feet)
Restrictions
For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
Availability
The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.