Truth or Fiction? (For those of you who have seen Kentucky Fried Movie, this show is called BULLSH*T or NOT)
The P-38 knobs of which you speak are golf-ball sized. "Several manufacturers of sporting goods re-tooled their existing plants and machinery to produce plastic knobs, handles, switches, and other small items that were needed for war production. Wherever possible, existing dies and molds were used both as a time saving and cost saving measure. A maker of football helmets could easily retool to make helmets for tank crews. A maker of golfing equipment made knobs for aircraft panels while drop forging tank parts at the same plant. The same lathes that had turned out baseball bats the year before started turning out massive quantities of mortar shells as the US war machine geared up to full production"
