Four lowercase lines and a hand with a knife: that is the whole poster.
Frederick G. Cooper (1883 to 1962) designed it in 1917 for the US Food Administration, the agency Herbert Hoover directed to manage civilian food supply during WW1. It belonged to the agency's "Food Will Win the War" voluntary conservation campaign, which aimed to cut American consumption of wheat, meat, fat and sugar so that reserves could reach Allied forces. Cooper was a founding member of the American Institute of Graphic Arts, an art director at Life magazine, and known for all-lowercase hand-lettering.
This is USFA Poster No. 3, lithographed by W.F. Powers Co. of New York. MoMA and the Smithsonian hold copies.
On the poster
A hand slices a loaf of bread on a round red board. Below it, Cooper's lowercase hand-lettering runs the full width of the sheet: "save a loaf / a week / help win / the war". Two horizontal red rule-lines frame the top and bottom of a cream ground with no background detail.
About this print
A digitally restored reproduction, printed on 200gsm Enhanced Matte Fine Art paper with pigment inks.




