As Memorial Day approaches, we look to scenes of World War II on the home front in Boston and New Bedford. Bostonians bought and sold bonds to help finance the war, and Hollywood film actress Dorothy Lamour even auctioned off items in downtown New Bedford for the war effort. The streets filled with celebrants when the war ended first in Europe, and then in Japan. — Lane Turner

• 

  Boston Globe Archive

  July 1, 1942: Boston retail stores opened a War Savings Bonds and Stamp Drive. The Chandler & Company store on Tremont Street kicked off their drive with these women selling bonds outside the store. From left, Virginia Brennan, Flora Brennan, Hildegard Burbridge, Irene Giers, Catherine Hayes, and Veronica Flaherty.
• 

  Boston Globe Archive

  July 2, 1942: "Drop your personal calling card on the Axis" was the pitch in a war bond drive. Jays, on Temple Place, opened the "Retailers for Victory" campaign with the sale of a $1,000 war bond and the first autograph made on the shell of a 100-pound bomb, which Navy Secretary Frank Knox had delivered there that morning. President Arthur P. Schier bought a $1,000 war bond to be first to autograph the bomb. From left, Mrs. Marion Meyer, vice president of Jays; Mrs. Jeremiah Hurley, of Brookline, second signer on the bomb; Ruth E. Broome, of Cambridge; and Schier and Kay Zetruer of Boston all signed the bomb, to be dropped somewhere on an Axis target.
• 

  Charles F. McCormick/Globe Staff

  Sept. 11, 1942: Hollywood star Dorothy Lamour sold War Bonds at a rate of $22,204 per minute in Fall River from a platform downtown. She worked at the job of selling for three hours and took in $3,996,792. More than 25,000 people jammed the streets surrounding City Hall to see her auction off the cigarette case in her hand for $11,000 in bonds. Later, she dined at a fund-raiser at the Mellen Hotel and ended her day at the Wamsutta Mills, where 16,000 textile workers pledged $500,000 to the war effort.
• 

  Edward Fitzgerald/Globe staff

  May 9, 1945: Office workers celebrated V-E Day in high style with confetti at Franklin and Devonshire streets in Boston.
• 

  Associated Press/File

  Aug. 10, 1945: Two chefs in a Boston Chinese restaurant cheered news headlines in the Boston Evening Globe announcing the Japanese offer to surrender.
• 

  Boston Globe Archive

  Aug. 15, 1945: Crowds celebrated the end of the war against Japan on Washington Street at the corner of Waltham Street in West Newton Square. See more From the Archives galleries.