Performance Appraisal Guide (Military Service Parodies, 1969-71)

Parodies of a performance appraisal guide in a military context can be traced back to WWII, if Spike Milligan is to be trusted.  This excerpt from his war diary for 16 November 1943 appears in his memoir, Mussolini: His Part in My Downfall (Penguin, 1978). 

The following parodies are taken from underground GI publications of the Vietnam War era.

 

A Four-Year Bummer (Chanute Air Force Base, Champaign, IL), vol. 1, no. 4, September 1969, p. 4.

 

Gigline (Fort Bliss, Texas), vol. 1, no. 4, November 1969, p. 12. (Also Open Sights (Washington, DC), vol. 2, no. 2, 1 March 1970, p. 8.)

GI Press Service (Washington, D.C.), vol. 1, no. 12, Nov. 27, 1969, p. 186. (Also We Got the Brass (Tokyo, Japan), no. 4, Summer 1970, p. 7.)

Grunt Free Press (Honolulu, HI), vol. 2, no. 2, April 1970, p. 17.

The Whig (Angeles City, Philippines), vol. 1, no. 2, Aug.-Sep. 1970, p. 2.

Minnesota Home Front Sniper (Minneapolis), vol. 1, no. 1, August 1971, p. 10.

Why (Okinawa, Japan), no. 1, 1971, p. 2.

All the periodicals featured above can be accessed at Independent Voices.

Concurrently school teachers shared variants that applied to their own work environment.

Ollie M. James, “Handled With Care.” The Cincinnati Enquirer, 12 Dec. 1968, p. 7.

“Teachers’ System Rates Principals.” Arizona Republic (Phoenix, AZ), 13 August 1969, p. 25.

[Sample phrases: leaps tall buildings, talks with God, talks to himself, walks on water, he is god]