The Brass Ring
by Bill Mauldin

Reviewed by Dion Osika (aka "Dodger")
Posted Feb-08-2003

Most people familiar with Mauldin's works have seen a copy of his Up Front book. This book was first published in 1945 and is a collection of Mauldin's wartime cartoons along with Mauldin's observations of the GI's life on the front. Since the first edition, Up Front has been reprinted many times. However, my book recommendation is not for Up Front, which is always a great read for anyone who has not done so.

I want to recommend Bill Mauldin's "The Brass Ring." This book was written by Mauldin in 1971 and is his autobiographical account of ten years of his life from 1935 to 1945. In it he covers his teenage years in New Mexico and his early desire to take up cartooning as a profession. Mauldin manages a loan from his grandmother to attend art school in Chicago and then finding himself with no funds to continue school or payback the loan, he joins the Arizona National Guard in the pre-Pearl Harbor years.

His account continues with stories of his duty in the 45th Division in Oklahoma and the formation of the small Division newspaper, The 45th Division News, which will provide the platform from which he will develop his famous 'Willie and Joe' characters.

This is a very enjoyable read as Mauldin writes with exceptional skill and great humor. It is clear that he was a keen observer of the events and 'characters' around him and he was able to bring many of these observations to his cartoons. The book is generously sprinkled with many of his early cartoons, especially the early development of Willie and Joe.

Joe, by the way, was originally an Indian and was drawn in that character. Mauldin used many gags depicting him as a 'stereotyped Indian.'

Mauldin writes and reflects the character of the WWII GI, who is fiercely independent and not in love with military life. Yet he describes the bond and trust that these men formed to enable them to perform their duty and prevail against the enemy.

On the book jacket there is a statement that I found to ring very true.
"...His (Bill Mauldin) career was summed up by an army historian who recently remarked: 'There will never be another Mauldin. The Pentagon will never let him happen again.'"

How would Willie and Joe survive in an army of "Ooo-Rah" boys dressed in pressed fatigues?

Check for used copies of Brass Ring at Amazon

Other Books by Bill Mauldin