From Executive Order 8802:

There shall be no discrimination in the employment of workers in defense industries and in Government, because of race, creed, color, or national origin.

The order was the first presidential directive on race since Reconstruction.

$10/week in 1940 amounts to about $166/week in 2013 terms.

A cashier at a McDonalds in Chicago makes about $7.69/hour. Assuming a 40-hour workweek, that comes out to $307.60/week.

So even in 1940, ten bucks a week was pretty rough.

This is still a small town. You can snag a house in Marion Junction (pop. 1,904) for less than $30K (as of winter 2013):

The Packard Motor Company was indeed still making cars sixty years ago–although just barely. The last Detroit-built Packard, the 4-door Patrician (!) sedan, rolled off the line in 1956.

The ‘56 Patrician cost around $4,000–or about $34,000 in 2013 dollars. Today that’s enough to get you a pretty sweet Chrysler 300S, but not quite enough to get you the John Varvatos tricked-out limited edition 300.

You’re gonna want the Mopar diamond grille anyways.

She’s referring to vending machines found in the men’s rooms of certain bars that dispense low-grade cologne.

bathroom Polo ≠ Polo Polo

Six strings refers to the six strings of a guitar and a half stack refers to an amp set consisting amp head and a speaker cap.

“HiiiPower” refers to Kendrick’s hand-sign of revolution. See HiiiPower.

HP is a common abbreviation for the Browning Hi-Power 9mm pistol. The Browning HP, first introduced in the early 20th century, represented a major leap forward in pistol design, most notably for its 13-round magazine capacity, almost twice that of contemporary designs such as the Luger or Colt M1911.