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Austin Clay
December 2, 2014
Oral History
Professor Rigelhaupt
Women at Home during World War II
The United States entered World War II after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on
December 7, 1941. This transformed American society because many men entered the military
and went to war. Men’s absence in society allowed women, who were typically homemakers to
enter the workforce in large numbers. Through an oral history interview with Patsy Tilton and a
variety of monographs about women’s lives during WWII, it is evident that the War changed
women’s lives both in their homes and in the workplace. Women volunteered or helped raise
money for the War effort, experienced food and gas rationing, blackouts, changes in fashion, and
felt the pressure of their husbands and children leaving home to go to war. The objective of this
essay is to discuss the important changes in women’s lives during the WWII era, while also
critically discussing an oral history interview with Patsy Tilton and how her viewpoints may be
biased based on her race, gender, and social status during the War.
The definition of oral history and its contribution to history as a whole has been debated
for years. Some historians have argued that oral history is not a primary source because it is not
created during the actual time period and is formed through memory. Through this research it
became evident though, that oral history is a primary source that gives historical information
meaning. Valerie Yow, editor of Oral History Review defines oral history as “the recording of
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personal testimony in oral form,”1 in her book Recording Oral History: A Guide for the
Humanities and Social Sciences (2005). It is important to understand that the interview with
Patsy does not represent the experiences of all young women during this era but is specific to
white middle class women in Long Brach, New Jersey. Oral history helps develop a deeper
understanding of what happened in common people’s day to day lives and it exposes the deeper
societal changes that occurred due historical events. Kathryn Anderson and Dana C. Jack wrote
in their work, “Learning to Listen: Interview Techniques and Analyses” in Women’s Words: The
Feminist Practice of Oral History (1991) that “Oral history interviews provide an invaluable
means of generating new insight about women's experiences of themselves in their worlds.”2
Patsy’s interview is an example of how oral history gives women a voice in history.
Patsy Tilton was born in Findlay, Ohio on May 29, 1928 but grew up in Long Branch,
New Jersey. She was thirteen years old when she heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor over the
radio, from that day forward she remembers seeing societal changes. Her mother, Leslie Eva
Kraft had always been a working woman because her father, Abe Kraft died when she was two
years old. As the U.S. entered WWII though, she saw other women enter the workforce and daily
changes occur such as blackouts, food rationing, and the changes in school. As a young girl she
even tried to help the War effort by raising money. She remembers WWII as a time when the
nation truly was united. She says that she saw patriotism everywhere. In Lynn Abrams work
“Oral History Theory,” (2010) Abram discusses the idea of three models of oral history usage.
These models are the reminiscence and community model which refers to giving the interviewer
a voice and a place in historical context, the evidential model which means that the interview is
1
Valerie Yow, Recording Oral History: A Guide for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Second ed. (Walnut
Creek: California, Altamira Press, 2005), 3.
2
Kathryn Anderson and Dana C. Jack,”Learning to Listen: Interview Techniques and Analyses,” in Women’s
Words: The Feminist Practice of Oral History, (New York: Routledge, 1991), 11.
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used to provide evidence and support a specific argument, the last model is the theoretical model,
which looks at oral history interviews in an analytical model.3 Patsy’s oral history interview is
being used in this essay by the reminiscence and community model and the evidential mode
because her interview gives her a voice regarding historical events and provides evidence to
support how society changed for women.
During WWII the image commonly known as “Rosie the Riveter” debuted in 1943 with
the slogan “We can do it” in an effort to promote working women. The absence of men left a
large number of vacant jobs just waiting to be filled. Many women were excited to enter the
workforce and join the war effort, only to be disappointed later on when they lost their jobs at the
end of the War. When asked about women’s roles during WWII, Tilton said, “A lot of them
entered the workforce, and some of them had already worked before. They worked in the factory
doing munitions; of course I was too young to go to work.” This quote shows that although Patsy
herself was unable to work, she did notice a huge change in society despite her young age. She
noticed this even though her own home life did not directly change. This suggests that the
societal change was quite huge because oftentimes people only remember events that they were
directly involved in. Alistar Thomson’s work, “Memory and Remembering in Oral History in
The Oxford Handbook of Oral History (2011) says, “Memorable events usually require direct
personal involvement.”4 Women entered jobs that were not only pink collar but even entered
blue collar jobs that were usually done by men. Patsy said they did this “because they were
patriotic and wanted to help out.” This was a drastically different than prewar America because
3
Lynn Abrams, Oral History Theory, (New York, New York, Routledge Taylor and Francis Group, 2010).
Alistar Thomson, “Memory and Remembering in Oral History” in The Oxford Handbook of Oral History,
(Oxford: New York, Oxford University Press, 2011), 84.
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prior to the War if women did work, it was usually in more feminine type jobs.5 Women were
suddenly working in factories, and building planes and ships. Some women worked as
electricians, riveters, and welders in defense plants. For Patsy, the War didn’t change her home
life too much but she saw changes in her community that she knew were going to change
women’s lives forever.
Homemakers also experienced changes in their lives during the War. Although they did
not enter the workforce directly, they oftentimes made an effort to volunteer their time or raise
money to contribute to the War effort. Patsy at the young age of fourteen discussed raising
money through a lemonade stand with her friend Lorette, she said, “we gave it [the money] to the
USO, United Service Organization, which helped the soldiers and everything and they thought it
was so great that we did that that they invited us to a dance at the USO.” Women were also able
to volunteer by growing victory gardens, selling war bonds, and even spending their time at the
Red Cross and Office of Civilian Defense.6 This allowed women to show their patriotism and
support the United States and the men in the military services without giving up their
homemaker roles. Patsy and Lorette’s involvement in raising money for the War is important
because it shows that their patriotic efforts were not inhabited by their young age. Patsy’s oral
narrative is specific to the experience of a young white woman. There were racial boundaries in
society and within the armed forces, as African Americans were still heavily segregated in the
U.S. Military. Mary Kay Quinlan writes her work “The Dynamics of Interviewing” in The
Oxford Handbook of Oral History (2011) that social status, educational background, gender,
religious and political beliefs, and regional identity are all factors that affect a person’s interview
5
Penny Summerfield, Reconstructing Wartime Lives, (New York: New York, Manchester University Press,
1998), 80.
6
Doris Weatherford, American Women and World War II, (New York: New York, Facts on File, 1990), 229.
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and shape their narratives.7 The fact that Patsy is a white middle class woman definitely affects
this interview. Throughout the interview Patsy was very proud of her country and continually
stressed the idea of patriotism during WWII. During the War, the United States created Japanese
Internment Camps, for people who were taken to these camps, their memory of this era would be
quite different. Patsy remembers hearing about Internment camps but remembers that as being an
event that occurred on the West coast of the United States and therefore she doesn’t actually
remember this going on. Patsy’s overall optimism associated with the War is a probably a
product of her social status in society.
Rationing was an idea that was taken from England and introduced in the U.S. in an
effort to fairly distribute scarce goods and keep prices reasonable to avoid inflation.8 Ration
books were distributed to families to ration gasoline, coffee, sugar, shoes, clothes, and many
other products. When asked about how people felt about rationing, Patsy said, “Nobody
complained about it because it was part of the War effort.” The decision to determine the point
value of ration items was a turning point for women because they were able to be involved in it.
The Office of Price Administration (OPA) hired a panel of twenty-thousand housewives to
represent the population, this allowed women to help represent and decide on the point values of
the items that they were purchasing.9 This changed the way that women were able to care for
their families during the War. Planning became even more important. An underground sort of
economy began in which women would trade their ration tickets with other women depending on
each other’s specific needs. Patsy said about the underground economy, “I heard about it, but we
didn’t do it. We traded amongst ourselves- our family.” Homemakers were also encouraged to
7
Mary Kay Quinlan, “The Dynamics of Interviewing” in The Oxford Handbook of Oral History, (Oxford:
New York, Oxford University Press, 2011), 34.
8
Weatherford, American Women and World War II, 201.
9
Amy Bentley, Eating for Victory: Food Rationing and Politics for Domesticity, (Chicago: Illinois, University
of Illinois Press, 1998), 16.
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save all fats and greases from cooking so that they could be processed into ammunition for
soldiers.
During the interview, Patsy also discussed blackouts and blackout wardens. Blackouts
meant that lights had to be off or black shades had to be covering the windows to ensure that
submarines couldn’t spot the ships at night. Patsy said, “They would blow a siren and the air raid
warden would come around and they would check for the lights and make sure that the black
shades were on, these were things that we had to do to keep the lights from showing up on the
beach.” This particular experience was common for people living in coastal areas such as Long
Branch, New Jersey where Patsy lived with her mother. Black outs affected women in Long
Branch because it meant that all the evening activities had to be done during the day before it got
dark outside. This added to the homemaker’s amount of work that they needed to complete
during the day.
The rationing of clothing and shoes also affected women at home. They were unable to
freely purchase these items for themselves or their children. In some cases, common items such
as nylon were completely unavailable. Patsy said, “The nylon went to war for parachutes so what
we did was, we took face make up and painted our legs with the face makeup. At that time the
stockings had a seem in the back of them, so someone would take an eyebrow pencil and draw a
seem down the back of our legs so it looked like we had stockings on.” Women were able to find
substitutions for things that they usually wore. Limited supplies also lead to a change in fashion
during WWII, because a lot of dyes were unavailable, many women wore bold, dark colors.
Wool was very limited so artificial fibers became popular and women’s coats would now be
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made out of rabbit instead of mink, seal, or beaver.10 Women also began to take extra care of
their clothing. They mended any damages or rips instead of throwing them out.
Women on the home front were affected by a changing dynamic within their household
as result of their husbands, boyfriends, or sons going away to war. Young women, like Patsy,
were still in school when the War broke out, therefore she saw many of the young men obtain
“war diplomas.” This phenomenon changed the demographics within schools, leaving mostly
young women to finish out their educations without the presence of their male classmates. When
asked about changes in school, Patsy said, “There was mostly girls in school because a lot of the
young men went [into the military] as soon as they turned seventeen. They went into the service
one way or another.” Men who obtained a “war diploma” were expected to finish high school
after doing their time in the service but some returned with wives known as “war time brides.”
These were women that the men had met while serving oversees and brought back to the United
States with them.11 To many mothers, their sons had left as boys and returned as men.
The War ended in August 1945 and as the men came home the industries started to get
ready for the postwar world, and for most industries, they weren’t interested in including women
as their workers any longer. Women were expected to return to their prewar positions as
homemakers and child bearers.12 For men, going to war meant preserving the American way of
life, while women’s way of life had been dramatically transformed. Although many women did
ultimately return to the home, other women, especially lower and middle class women found that
they enjoyed having an identity outside of the home. The taste of freedom that they had
experienced through the workforce was there to stay. This new era of the “working woman” was
10
Penny Summerfield, Women Workers in the Second World War, (Sydney, Austrialia, Croom Helm Ltd.,
1984), 128.
11
Weatherford, American Women and World War II, 245.
12
Emily Yellin, Our Mothers’ War: American Women at Home and at the Front during WWII, (New York:
New York, Free Press, 2004) 68.
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one that Patsy had experienced her entire life and found to be normal after always watching her
mother work, but men continued to be uncomfortable with the idea of women within the
workplace.
Women’s lives during World War II changed dramatically at home whether they entered
the work place or not. The country as a whole had to pull together to ration items, volunteer,
donate, and support one another. Patsy’s interview on WWII continually talks about the
patriotism that was seen each and every day until the War was over. Patsy’s oral history
interview supported historical evidence and provided insight into the lives of young middle class
white women and their families, not society as a whole. Due to Patsy’s race, gender, and social
status she saw the Wartime era as a time of unity and patriotism in the United States. After
WWII many women did go back to their traditional homemakers lives, but even their lives had
been changed forever by the War.
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Bibliography
Abrams, Lynn. Oral History Theory, (New York: New York: Routledge Taylor and Francis
Group, 2010).
Anderson, Kathryn and Dana C. Jack. “Learning to Listen: Interview Techniques and
Analyses,” in Women’s Words: The Feminist Practice of Oral History, ed. Donald A.
Ritchie (New York: Routledge Taylor and Francis Group, 1991).
Bentley, Amy. Eating for Victory: Food Rationing and Politics of Domesticity, (Chicago:
Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1998).
Caldwell, Sorel. The Women who Wrote the War: Riveting Saga of World War II’s Daredevil
Women Correspondents, (New York: Arcade Publishing, 2011).
Erenberg, Lewis A., and Susan E. Hirsch. The War in American Culture: Society and
Consciousness during World War II, (Chicago: Illinois: Chicago University Press, 1996).
Klein, Yvonne M. Beyond the Home Front: Women’s Autobiographical Writing of Two World
Wars, (Oxford: New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).
Quinlan, Mary Kay. “The Dynamics of Interviewing,” in The Oxford Handbook or Oral History,
(Oxford: New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).
Summerfield, Penny. Reconstructing Wartime Lives, (New York: New York: Manchester
University, 1998).
Summerfield, Penny. Women Workers in the Second World War, (Sydney: Australia: Croom
Helm Ltd., 1984).
Terkel, Studs. The Good War: An Oral History of World War II, (New York: New York: The
New Press, 1984).
Thomson, Alistar. “Memory and Remembering in Oral History,” in The Oxford Handbook of
Oral History, (Oxford: New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).
Weatherford, Doris. American Women and World War II, (New York: New York: Facts on File,
1990).
Yellin, Emily. Our Mother’s War: American Women at Home and at the Front during WWII,
(New York: New York: Free Press, 2004).
Yow, Valerie. Recording Oral History: A Guide for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Second
ed. (Walnut Creek: California: Altamira Press, 2005).