Joe Smith, American 1942

In 1942, Joe [Robert Young] Smith is a “buck an hour” crew chief on the Lockheed P-38 Lightning assembly line at a Los Angeles defense plant. When plant president Mr. Edgerton [Russell Hicks] and his supervisor Blake McKettrick [Jonathan Hale] summon him, Joe is grilled by Freddie Dunhill [Harvey Stephens] and Gus Stoffen [William Forrest], who urge him to draw from memory a blueprint for a top‑secret project. Demonstrating his skill, Joe earns a promotion to head up a new effort centered on the Norden bombsight, a device whose secrets could tilt the war in America’s favor.

Yet the news forces Joe to keep a delicate secret from his wife, Mary Smith [Marsha Hunt], and even from their fourth‑grade son Johnny Smith [Darryl Hickman], as well as his coworkers. Soon a shadowy group targets him, intent on uncovering the bombsight’s plans. After a late‑night departure from the plant, his car is forced off the road and he is spirited away to a deserted house. Blindfolded and beaten by four men, they press him to reveal the designs. Remembering that Johnny also harbors a secret his family guards, Joe refuses to cooperate and endures brutal punishment.

When the would‑be killers realize they have no option but to kill him, Joe is driven away and then hurls himself from the car. An elderly couple happens upon him in the street, and, though still blindfolded, he quietly collects clues—the sounds of their vehicle, the rhythm of footsteps—that help him reconstruct the route to the perpetrators’ hideout. During a police reconstruction, Joe guides investigators to a house where three men are confronted; the ringleader is missing, and the tension tightens around the remaining conspirators.

Back at home, Gus [William Forrest], Freddie [Harvey Stephens], Edgerton [Russell Hicks], and McKettrick [Jonathan Hale] arrive to thank him for his bravery. The moment of truth comes when Joe recognizes the distinctive ring worn by the leader, and the police arrest McKettrick before he can escape. A month later, on Father’s Day, Mary and Joe host a party with friends from work, and Johnny presents his father with a small, heartfelt gift—a tie. When his peers hail him as a hero, Joe gently counters that there are no heroes in America—only people who don’t like being pushed around.

there are no heroes in America, just people who don’t like being pushed around.