1939 British Poster Revived for Current Crisis

This is so British, stiff upper lip and all that, and I want the Tee shirt.

There is no fuss, no frills, no clever design or wordplay, just the crown of George VI on a red background and a five-word message: Keep Calm And Carry On.

It is a veritable stiff upper-lip of a poster and has been heralded the 'greatest motivational poster ever'. It hangs on walls everywhere from Buckingham Palace to the National Trust HQ, No10 to the officers' mess in Basra.

Its message pops up on mugs, mouse mats, tea towels, T-shirts (David Beckham reportedly has one), rugs and even the cover of a recent magazine for hedge fund managers.

Thanks to Stewart Manley, who co-owns a Northumberland bookshop with his wife Mary, it sells by the thousand every week, 70 years after it was commissioned by the Ministry of Information as a World War II propaganda tool.

So it comes as a bit of a surprise to learn that the scarlet missive never actually made it into circulation during the war.

In fact, despite seeming to be part of our historical furniture, it wasn't until 2000, when Stewart and Mary discovered one of only two perfect originals in a dusty box of second-hand books he'd bought at an auction, that this inspirational message started popping up on walls all over Britain.

'I found a little folded poster right at the bottom of a box of books that had been lying around for months in the back of the shop,' says Stewart, who is 60-something and cheery-looking, with big specs and an impressive grey beard.

'So I opened it out and thought: "Oh gosh! Isn't that wonderful and so British."

More pictures and the rest of the story HERE.

More later.

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