The Washington Mosque and Islamic Center, as shown to Indonesian readers

An Indonesian-language color photo poster of the Islamic Center and mosque in Washington, D.C., filed with U.S. Information Agency posters, catalog date 11 December 1956. The caption credits the building to representatives of Muslim-majority countries and donations from American Muslims (NAID 6949123).

What the sheet shows

A color photograph shows the Islamic Center and its mosque in Washington, D.C., with an Indonesian title line and caption. The caption explains the building's layout and who paid for it.

Lembaga Islam dan Mesdjid Ummat Islam di Washington, D.C., Amerika Serikat

Mesdjid dan Lembaga Islam ini ada di Washingtou, ibukota Amerika Serikat. Gedung ini didirikan oleh usaha bersama wakil² negara² jang penduduknja beragama Islam di Washington, serta sumbangan² dari orang² Muslimin Amerika. [...]

[Archive's English translation:] The Islamic Institute and Mosque of the Islamic Community in Washington, D.C., United States. This mosque and Islamic Institute are in Washington, the capital of the United States. The building was erected through the joint effort of representatives of countries whose populations are Muslim in Washington, with donations from American Muslims. [...] The Institute is a library and research body for people who study the religion of Islam.

Sent to multiple posts

The National Archives files the poster in Record Group 306, with the U.S. Information Agency's posters distributed in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East, under a catalog date of 11 December 1956. The archive's title says it went to multiple posts. The maker line names the agency and its State Department predecessor. The caption names the United States as the place but not as the sender, and FRAME classes the source as blurred.

Who built the mosque, by the caption's account

FRAME tags it plain folks and glittering generalities: one positive image of Muslim worship in the American capital, and nothing else said. The archive files the purpose as reassure, and the theme as religion.

The detail that matters is who built the mosque, according to the caption: diplomats from Muslim-majority countries and American Muslim donors, working together. The caption does not credit the American government, and it describes the institute as a library and research body. That is the free exercise of religion working as it should: believers building their own house of worship. A reader of the poster was shown a building and told who paid for it.

The poster's weakness is the one it shares with most of this file. Nothing on it says that it came through a U.S. agency. A reader weighing a claim about another country's religious tolerance would want to know that the claim came from that country's government. An earlier sheet for Burma, We Want / We Do Not Want, put freedom of worship on a list of liberties; this one shows a building. The program is described on the USIA posters abroad hub, and freedom of worship as a wartime theme on the Four Freedoms page.