The works of Pulitzer Prize winner Bill Mauldin, whose editorial cartoons chronicled and satirized World War II soldiers in combat, are featured in an exhibit at the Airborne & Special Operations Museum.

“Drawn to Combat: Bill Mauldin and the Art of War” showcases nearly 150 of Mauldin’s original drawings and published cartoons, as well as personal material from his career, according to the museum’s website.

The exhibit opened Dec. 20 and will be on display at the museum through June 11.

On loan from the Pritzker Military Museum and Library, “Drawn to Combat” explores Mauldin’s career with a focus on his skill in documenting and satirizing military life and political affairs, according to the website.

Your support helps ensure a more informed community. Donate today.

Mauldin was born William Henry Mauldin in 1921 in Mountain Park, New Mexico, according to Encyclopedia Britannica.

He studied cartooning at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and enlisted in the Army in September 1940. He underwent infantry training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and in 1943 shipped out with his division to Sicily, where he joined the Mediterranean edition of the Army newspaper Stars and Stripes, the encyclopedia says. He covered the fighting in Sicily; at Salerno, where he was wounded; and at other locations in Italy, France and Germany.

Mauldin received a Pulitzer Prize in 1945 for a cartoon showing battle-weary troops with the sardonic caption “Fresh American troops flushed with victory.” Many of his cartoons featured Willie and Joe, a pair of disheveled enlisted men caught between the horrors of war and the Army hierarchy, the encyclopedia reports.

After his discharge in June 1945, Mauldin drew cartoons depicting the soldier’s difficult transition back to civilian life. In 1958, he joined the St. Louis Post-Dispatch as an editorial cartoonist, according to the encyclopedia. In 1959, he won a second Pulitzer Prize for a cartoon about the suppression of civil liberties in the Soviet Union.

In 1962, Mauldin joined the Chicago Sun-Times, where his cartoons dealt with national and international issues and were widely syndicated, the encyclopedia says. His illustrations appeared in numerous magazines, including Life and Sports Illustrated.

Mauldin died Jan. 22, 2003, in Newport Beach, California.

The Airborne & Special Operations Museum, at 100 Bragg Blvd., is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. Admission is free.

For more information, go to https://www.asomf.org/event/art-of-war/ or call 910-643-2778.