Entitled: "Navy! Uncle Sam is calling you - enlist in the Navy!" 1917. Poster showing Uncle Sam pointing at the viewer. Uncle Sam (initials U.S.) is a common national personification of the American government that, according to legend, came into use during the War of 1812. The image of Uncle Sam was shown publicly for the first time, according to some, in a picture by James Montgomery Flagg on the cover of the magazine Leslie's Weekly, on July 6, 1916, with the caption "What Are You Doing for Preparedness?" More than four million copies of this image were printed between 1917 and 1918. It was this image more than any other that set the appearance of Uncle Sam as the elderly man with white hair and a goatee wearing a white top hat with white stars on a blue band, and red and white striped trousers.