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When Boys Wore Dresses, and Other Fascinating Traditions and Conventions From History

Khalid Elhassan May 16, 2024 29 min

Tradition - A young King Louis XIV, in male clothes after he was breeched, and his young brother, the Duc d Orleans, in a dress before he was breeched — A young King Louis XIV, in male clothes after he was breeched, and his young brother, the Duc d Orleans, in a dress before he was breeched. Pinterest

World War II’s Most Viral Tradition

WWII GIs tagged ‘Kilroy Was Here’ everywhere. AR Gunners Magazine

Occasionally, nowadays, graffiti of a long-nosed bald guy peeping over a wall can be spotted, usually accompanied by the caption “Kilroy Was Here“. It is homage to an American viral meme that spread around the world in the Second World War, and popped up wherever American servicemen could be found. GIs competed to try and tag the most obscure, out of the way, and unlikely locations with the picture and text that Kilroy had been there. Kilroy had apparently been everywhere. The meme was spotted in barracks, bathrooms, cafeterias, Navy ship holds, the ruins of wrecked buildings, tents, carved on tree trunks, and on anything that could get chalked or painted.

Tradition - 'Kilroy Was Here' on the back of a WWII Dodge truck — ‘Kilroy Was Here’ on the back of a WWII Dodge truck. Wikimedia

“Kilroy Was Here” went so viral that it sometimes appeared even before American GIs arrived. US soldiers who stormed enemy beaches claimed to have seen notices that Kilroy had been there ahead of them. The meme mystified Japanese intelligence. Rumor had it that even the Fuhrer wanted to know the significance of Kilroy, and whether it had some secret espionage connotations. After Germany was defeated, Stalin saw “Kilroy was here” tagged in the VIP bathroom at the Potsdam Conference, and asked who he was. A good question: who was Kilroy, and what kicked off World War II’s most viral meme tradition?

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.