Wot no Chads?

If you live in the United States you might recognise the Chad as Kilroy . Others may even recognise the character above as Foo . Everyone is correct (see what a powerful tool for peace Chads are). The graffiti of a man with little or no hair peering over a wall has a long and fascinating history. The American Kilroy, who usually comes with the slogan Kilroy was here! rather than the Wot no…? British readers are used to, has even been credited with playing a part in the fall of Nazi Germany and Communist Russia. I'm not making this up, honestly!

Legend has it that a man named James J. Kilroy, worked for the Bethlehem Steel Company's Quincy shipyard during the Second World War. His job was to inspect the warships under construction. Using a piece of yellow chalk he would mark inspected ships with the slogan Kilroy was here . These marks would later be seen by shipyard workers and servicemen who copied the writing, scratching it onto surfaces throughout the world.

This graffiti became so common that it even caught the attention of a paranoid Adolf Hitler, who became convinced that Kilroy was a real man – a spy out to assassinate him and bring down the Third Reich. The graffiti was, in the nutty-nazi's eyes, a secret code left by Kilroy and his agents. In actual fact servicemen would etch a Kilroy into the wall of any new place they found themselves in. It soon became a challenge to be the first to put a Kilroy in the most far-out place possible.

It has been reported, although the historical accuracy is somewhat doubtful, that Kilroy turned up in Potsdam , Germany in 1945 during a meeting of the Big Three. Stalin himself is said to have walked out of the exclusive toilet, reserved for the personal use of Atlee, Truman and himself, and whispered into the ear of an aide “who is this Kilroy?”

Meanwhile in the United Kingdom , Chads were deployed wherever shortages were felt. The very first Chad is believed to have been Wot no Eggs? Unlike the Kilroys which were just the written slogan, the Chads featured the baldy egg-faced wall-peering hero we know today. It is not known when the Chad and Kilroy merged into one entity. Most probably, the two intermingled at some point during the war. There is a Kilroy was here with Chad engraved on the Washington DC WWII Memorial.