Actress Marjorie Main welcomes ‘Deadeye’ division home

• Posted By: Scott Harrison
• Posted On: 12:42 a.m. | October 5, 2012

Feb. 2, 1946: Actress Marjorie Main is hoisted by soldiers of the 96th “Deadeye” Division during welcome home celebration in Los Angeles.

This Page 1 photo accompanied a short Feb. 3, 1946, Los Angeles Times story reporting:

A lusty, old-time western welcome greeted 1,800 men of the famed 96th (Deadeye) Division at the Los Angeles Port of Embarkation yesterday. The 1,800 men, among the 3,081 returning veterans arriving in the harbor aboard the transport General Langfitt, got a special greeting from Marjorie Main, western pistol-packing motion-picture actress who was voted the “pinup girl” for the division in a spirited contest.

Miss Main, decked in a 10-gallon hat and with two guns at her hips, greeted the men from aboard the Port of Embarkation greeter ship Snafu Maru and then went aboard the General Langfitt. Later she went to Camp Anza staging area to help serve the division men their first Stateside dinner….

Miss Main was elected “Occupation Girl” of the 96th Division because her two-fisted screen characterizations embodied the same rugged virtues that carried the division through campaigns in Leyte and Okinawa.

Main, playing Ma Kettle, was nominated for the best supporting actress Oscar for the 1947 movie “The Egg and I.”