Kilroy was here is an American popular culture expression, often seen in graffiti. Its origins are open to speculation, but recognition of it and the distinctive doodle of "Kilroy" peeking over a wall is known almost everywhere among U.S. residents who lived during World War II and through the Korean War.
Similar doodles also appear in other cultures. In an Australian variant, the character peeping over the wall is not named Kilroy but Foo, as in "Foo was here". In the United Kingdom, such graffiti is known as a "chad". In Chile, the graphic is known as a "sapo" (slang for nosy); this might refer to the character's peeping, an activity associated with frogs because of their protruding eyes. In Mexico it is known as "El Fisgon". A very similar figure is "Tosun" in Turkey. Tosun is both a less used male name and also refers to a bullock. It is used as "Bunu yazan Tosun" ("Tosun wrote this"). In Poland Kilroy is replaced with "Józef Tkaczuk", an elementary school janitor (as an urban legend says). Graffiti writings have the form of sentences like "Gdzie jest Józef Tkaczuk?" ("Where is Joseph Tkatchuk?") and "Tu byłem - Józef Tkaczuk" ("I was here - Joseph Thatchuk"). It has appeared in movies as well—at the end of the World War II war comedy Kelly's Heroes, Kelly and his men leave the doodle in a bank they've just robbed, along with the words, "UP YOURS, BABY". It appears in the 1970 film Patton on the side of a tank.
Sometimes pranksters have been known to write "Clap my hands and jump for joy; I was here before Kilroy", followed by "Sorry to spoil your little joke; I was here, but my pencil broke. --KILROY".
Origins
The phrase appears to have originated through United States servicemen, who would draw the doodle and the text "Kilroy Was Here" on the walls or elsewhere they were stationed, encamped, or visited. Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable notes that it was particularly associated with the Air Transport Command, at least when observed in the United Kingdom.[1]
One of the first sightings was at a Grainger Branch in Baltimore where it was rumored to have been drawn by Kilroy himself. One theory identifies James J. Kilroy (1902–1962)[2], an American shipyard inspector, as the man behind the signature. During World War II he worked at the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy, Massachusetts, where he claimed to have used the phrase to mark rivets he had checked. The builders, whose rivets J. J. Kilroy was counting, were paid depending on the number of rivets they put in. A riveter would make a chalk mark at the end of his or her shift to show where they had left off and the next riveter had started. Unscrupulous riveters discovered that, if they started work before the inspector arrived, they could receive extra pay by erasing the previous worker's chalk mark and chalking a mark farther back on the same seam, giving themselves credit for some of the previous riveter's work. J.J. Kilroy stopped this practice by writing "Kilroy was here" at the site of each chalk mark. At the time, ships were being sent out before they had been painted, so when sealed areas were opened for maintenance, soldiers found an unexplained name scrawled. Thousands of servicemen may have potentially seen his slogan on the outgoing ships and Kilroy's omnipresence and inscrutability sparked the legend. Afterwards, servicemen could have begun placing the slogan on different places and especially in new captured areas or landings. At some later point, the graffito (Chad) and slogan (Kilroy was here) must have merged.[3]
The New York Times indicated this as the origin in 1946, based on the results of a contest conducted by the American Transit Association to establish the origin of the phenomenon. The article noted that Kilroy had marked the ships themselves as they were being built—so, at a later date, the phrase would be found chalked in places that no graffiti-artist could have reached (inside sealed hull spaces, for example), which then fed the mythical significance of the phrase—after all, if Kilroy could leave his mark there, who knew where else he could go?[4] Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable notes this as a possible origin, but suggests that "the phrase grew by accident".[1]
Another possibility is that Kilroy was actually Richard Kilroy O'Malley, from Butte, Montana, author of "Mile High, Mile Deep" and an Associated Press correspondent during World War II who was subsequently posted in Berlin, Korea, Cyprus, Paris, North Africa and the Belgian Congo.[citation needed]
Author Charles Panati says: "The mischievous face and the phrase became a national joke." He goes on to say: "The outrageousness of the graffiti was not so much what it said, but where it turned up."[5]
Kilroy was the most popular of his type in World War II, as well as today. Herbie (Canadian), Overby (Los Angeles- late 1960s), Chad (British- World War II), and Mr. Foo (Australian- World War I & II) never reached the popularity Kilroy did. The ‘major’ Kilroy graffito fad ended in the 1950s, but today people all over the world still scribble ‘Kilroy was here’ in schools, trains, and other similar public areas.
Legends
There are many urban legends attached to the Kilroy graffiti. One states that Adolf Hitler believed that Kilroy was some kind of American super spy because the graffiti kept turning up in secure Nazi installations, presumably having been actually brought on captured Allied military equipment. Another states that Stalin was the first to enter an outhouse especially built for the leaders at the Potsdam conference. Upon exiting, Stalin asked an aide: "Who is this Kilroy?" Another legend states that a German officer, having seen frequent "Kilroys" posted in different cities, told all of his men that if they happened to come across a "Kilroy" he wanted to question him personally.
The graffiti is supposedly located on various significant or difficult-to-reach places such as on the torch of the Statue of Liberty, on the Marco Polo Bridge in China, in huts in Polynesia, on a high girder on the George Washington Bridge in New York, at the peak of Mt. Everest, on the underside of the Arc de Triomphe, scribbled in the dust on the moon, in World War II pillboxes scattered around Germany, on a tile in the bathroom of a Grainger in Baltimore, around the sewers of Paris, and, in tribute to its origin, engraved in the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C.[6]
That the expression antedates World War II is indicated in a film on Fort Knox shown on the History Channel. According to the History Channel's account[citation needed], young men were hired in 1937 to help move the gold bars. In one scene, when the narrator mentions that some of these workers left graffiti, the message "Kilroy was here" appears on a wall briefly but distinctly with the date 5/13/37.
Fiction
- The science-fiction author Isaac Asimov wrote a short story "The Message" giving the origin as a time-travelling historian from the future, named Kilroy, who felt compelled to leave his mark while observing an amphibious assault during World War II. It is included in the anthology Earth is Room Enough.
- Author Joseph Heller mentions Kilroy in the novel Catch-22 and discusses Kilroy's health and mortality in Closing Time, the sequel to Catch-22. In Closing Time the lead character, John Yossarian, asks if Kilroy is dead and assumes that Kilroy must have died during the Vietnam War if not during the Korean War.
- In Robert Heinlein's 1948 book Space Cadet the name of the first true space ship, which traveled from the Earth to the Moon, is named "Kilroy was Here."
- In the M*A*S*H episode "The Bus", Hawkeye Pierce writes Kilroy in the dirty window right underneath BJ because of the resemblance to the Kilroy lookalike and BJ wasn't responding to a question asked by Hawkeye.
- In the closing scene of the 1970 Clint Eastwood movie, Kelly's Heroes, the "Kilroy Was Here" tag is left on the inside bank wall as the platoon departs in their truck full of stolen gold, with the caption "Up Yours Baby!"
- In the Code Lyoko episode "Ultimatum", the phrase can be seen on the wall of the warehouse room in which Odd and Yumi are being held hostage. "Kilroy" is spelt with two L's.
- A "Peanuts" comic strip had Snoopy finding a pencil and a piece of paper on a desk. Seeing that he is alone, Snoopy draws (with his right paw) a simplified cat and a "Kilroy Was Here" doodle to his smiling satisfaction.
- In the video game 'Counter-Strike Source' there is a "Kilroy Was Here" spray-mark.
- In Halo 3, on Veteran's Day, there is a spray-mark of "Kilroy Was Here" on the map Valhalla.
- In Brothers In Arms Hell's Highway you are asked to find three kilroys in each mission and then mark " Killroy was here" for unlockable content.
- In J.C. Hutchins' '7th Son Trilogy' one of the main characters, a clone, calls himself Kilroy 2.0, the cyber savant that can hear the walls speak to him, while connected to the his disciples or followers, he greets them by saying "Kilroy 2.0 is here".
- In the Looney Tunes short "Haredevil Hare", Bugs Bunny passes a rock on the moon with the words "Kilroy was here" painted on it shortly after remarking that he is the first living thing on the moon
- At the last panel in one Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, Calvin had made a snowman Kilroy peeking over the hill in which his dad looks on in surprise.
- On page S176 of Mark Z. Danielewski's novel Only Revolutions Sam's narration says "Kilroy's here."
Popular music
- The Move song "Kilroy was here" is about the phrase appearing everywhere and about who he could be.
- The Styx song "Mr. Roboto," proclaims "I'm Kilroy." The phrase, "Kilroy was Here," is also the name of the original album featuring that song.
- The OutKast song "Jazzy Belle," contains the line "Over the years I been up on my toes and yes I seen thangs, like Kilroy"
References
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