The Bretton Woods conference in summer 1944 saw the global rise of the American Economic Empire—the empire of the dollar.

“Words alone cannot restore lost years”

The war correspondent and the entertainer shared a mission to connect with those in service during World War II.  

“On our fighting front, there are no silent nights, but there are plenty of holy nights."

Early on in World War II, Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring, one of Adolf Hitler’s top lieutenants, said that Americans could only make refrigerators and razor blades—they would never be able to produce the military equipment and supplies necessary to defeat Nazi Germany. Hitler took the same view in his public speeches, but privately he knew the clock was ticking. Germany would have to achieve victory fast, before American production had time to ramp up.

In William Shirer's war memoir, two foreign correspondents walk in a Berlin park and share a farewell drink as a global inferno nears ignition.  

The Oscars host for the ages presided over the 1943 ceremony. 

Find out how the Pearl Harbor attacks influenced this fire truck, which is the focus for Drafts for Crafts 2018.

Meet America's oldest National Park Ranger—a wartime Home Front worker profiled in the Museum's 2018 Electronic Field Trip about African American Experiences in World War II. 

Leon Werth captures the chaos and uncertainty that preceded the Nazis into Paris.