"Painting from the Saturday Evening Post."; "Additional copies may be obtained upon request from the Division of Public Inquiries, Office of War Information, Washington, D.C."; "U.S. Government Printing Office."; "1943-O-510256."; The poster depicts men and women of various races and faiths, including a woman with rosary beads, with hands clasped in prayer.; Norman Rockwell was a 20th-century American painter and illustrator. His works enjoy a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of American culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life scenarios he created for The Saturday Evening Post magazine for more than four decades. The Four Freedoms or Four Essential Human Freedoms is a series of four oil paintings that Rockwell produced in 1943 for reproduction in The Saturday Evening Post alongside essays by prominent thinkers of the day. Later they were the highlight of a touring exhibition sponsored by the Saturday Evening Post and the United States Department of the Treasury. The Four Freedoms theme was derived from the 1941 State of the Union Address by United States President Franklin Roosevelt in which he identified four essential human rights (Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, and Freedom from Fear) that should be universally protected. The Office of War Information printed four million sets of Four Freedoms posters by the end of the war.; World War II was a massive conflict which involved a majority of the nations of the world, and became the most widespread and deadliest event in human history; it had profound ramifications politically and economically that lasted into the next century. Armed conflict broke out in 1939, resulting primarily from issues and tensions not resolved by World War I, and spurred by desires of expansion; the aggressive Axis powers, led by Nazi Germany, Italy, and Japan, were opposed by the Allies, including France, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, China, and the United States, although dozens of countries participated. Gradually, the Allies asserted control, and victory in Europe was declared 8 May 1945, followed by victory over Japan in the Pacific theatre 2 September. In addition to the loss of life among troops, civilian casualties numbered in the millions. Posters were used extensively throughout the war by countries on both sides for purposes such as propaganda, morale, and the broad dissemination of information.; The United States Office of War Information (OWI) was a U.S. government agency created during World War II to consolidate government information services. It operated from June 1942 until September 1945. It coordinated the release of war news for domestic use, and, using posters and radio broadcasts, worked to promote patriotism, warn about foreign spies and recruit women into war work. The office also established an overseas branch, which launched a large scale information and propaganda campaign abroad.; The War Finance Committee was placed in charge of supervising the sale of all bonds, and the War Advertising Council promoted voluntary compliance with bond buying. More than a quarter of a billion dollars worth of advertising was donated during the first three years of the National Defense Savings Program. The government appealed to the public through popular culture. Norman Rockwell's painting series, the Four Freedoms, toured in a war bond effort that raised $132 million.