America during World War II: Home Life

World War II defense stamps
Figure 1.--This littke boy named Keith participated in a pet parade. Mom wrote on the back, "Taken Sept. 1942. Keith was in a pet parade & won third prize $2.00 in defense stamps." (Defense stamps were bought by children and saved in little books until they had enough for a bond." This was one way America financed the War.

World War II accounts of course focus on the desperate fighting fought out on the far-flung battlefields of the War. An important topic is also the home front. This is especially true of America which in President Roosevelt's words became the great Arsenal of Democracy as well as its breadbasket. American war production exceeded that of all the Axis countries combined. We have begun to collect information on American homelife during the War. It armed not only its own forces, but helped armed its allies as well. Concerning the Ameroican home front there are a range of interesting topics, including advertisng, rationing, popular culture, and much more. The American homefront not only played a major role in the winning the War, but the vast effort to expand productio also changed Ameica in many fundamental ways.

Commercial Advertising

The 1940s begins with America returning to affluence in the early 1940s and then after Pearl Harbor (1941) 4 years of War. This of course significantly affected advrtising. As the economy hifted to war proiduction, advertising as not as important as during an era of producing consumer goods. After the German and Japanese surrender (1945), the United States quickly returned to a peace-time economy and an exposion of advertising as the economy expanded. We have found a range of advertising from the 1940s. Knickers have obviously gone out of fashion. They show younger boys dressing up in Eton suits with actual Etoin collars. School scenes show most boys wearing long pants. "T"shits had become popular. Cun and Boy Scouts appear in a number if adverisements.

Rationing

Home life in America was vey different than in the occupied countries or even Britain and Germany after 1941. The Office of Price Administration (OPA) set up a system of rationing. During the War, OPA rationed 20 essential items including gasoline, rubber, shoes, silk, nylon, butter, sugar, chocolate, meat, milk and coffee. Families ate substitutes for products they liked such as honey for sugar. Maccroni (now called pasta) was an increasingly common dinner-table item. Even chicle, the main ingredient of bubble gum was no longer available and a synthetic rubber was substituted. Blowing bubbles, a favorite America kid activity, became hard work indeed. Probably the item that most affected American families was the food rationing. Supplies of many food stuffs as well as were limited to support both American servicemen as well as servicemen in Allied countries. Everyone made do with less. Still Americans ate better during the war then the people in ant othermajor combatent country. Schools offered home economics classes where they learned gardening, rationing system, recipies, and other useful information. They were able to use the information they obtained at home by working in their Victory Gardens, and helping sometimes confused family members understand the complexities of the rationing system. Girls helped their mothers make foods from different recipes in Liberty cookbooks. Many families also canned and preserved the food they grew in their gardens.

Radio

Virtually every American family had a radio which was usually given a place of honor in the living room. The radio was at the time a major piece of furniture. There were no transistors in 1941 and the vacume tubes used in radios made sets much larger than modern radios. Most American families would gather around the radio after dinner. Listening to news broadcasts and special programs on the radio was a familiar after dinner activity. Estimates indicate that Three-quarters of all Americans used the radio as a major source of information on the war. Parents would often update war maps after listening to overseas correspondents. Edward R. Murrow was best know because of his London broadcasts during the Blitz, but other correspondents such as Eric Severide and Robert Schrier also broadcast from Europe, insome cases from Berlin and some occupied countries before Hitler declared War on America in December 1941. Some parents also worried about the impact of the War reporting as well as some vilent radio programs would have on their children--a concern which has continued to this daty. Children listened to radio adventure programs an average of 14 hours a week, much less than the moder TV generation. Some of the programs most popular with children were Captain Midnight, The Shadow ("Who knows what evil lurkes in the minds of men. The Shadow knows."), The Green Hornet, Jack Armstong--the all American Boy, Dick Tracey, The Lone Ranger, Tom Mix, Sky King, Terry and the Pirates and the most popular radio hero, Superman (who was introduced in 1938 just as the NAZI menace was becoming apparent to many Americans). These heros except for dated ones like the Lone Ranger pitched right into the War eefort. The plots of many of the shows involved foiling the misdeeds of Japanese and German evil dooers. Many of these programs were based on popular comic strips and would be some of the most important eraly television programs after the War. The radio adventure programs as well as the daytime series had a simplistic moral tone of good versus. evil with justice always prevailing in the end. Listening to these programs today one is struck by how much more evil the Japanese milatarists and German NAZIs actually were than the comic book presentations. Children were often encouraged at the end of the program to help out in any way they could: collecting scrap materials, buying war bonds, planting a victory garden, writing to a service person, and a variety of other suggested activities.

Service Banners

Families of service men were entitled to display a service flag or banner, usually placed in the front window. This was a tradition began in World War I. Many American wars were controversial. Thanks to the Japanese, World War II was not. And this was before the extent of NAZI barbarity became well known. The public was all in to the war effort, rather surpriing given the strength of the Isolationist Movement before the War. There is no data on the prevalence of families displaying this banners, but our general sence tht it was very widespread to do so. The actual banners had a wide red norder with an interior white field with blue stars for each active duty serviceman. A gold star meant that a family member had been killed on active duty. This gave rise to the term 'Gold Star Mothers'. These banners were a way that families had of honoring and thinking of their service members. Seeing the blue stars was a way of keeping their absent fmily mmbers constantly in their mind. And for the gold stars, a part of the greving process. Other terms were used such as Blue of Gold Star wives. Gold Star Mother is certainly the most emotive term. Charitable support organizations were established for Gold Star mothers, Gold Star wives, Blue Star mothers, and Blue Star wives. The last Sunday in September is observed as Gold Star Mother's Day. Gold Star family members are entitled to wear a Gold Star Lapel Button.

Family Dynamics

Many children as well wives had a difficult time dealing with the absence of dads and brothers. They fearing the loss of loved ones and all too many had to learn about death. Mothers assumed new respnsibilities in the household. Some young unattached women actually enlisted in female auxileries of the different services. A much larger number, including married women with children, got jobs to support thecwar effort and wrote checks for the first time. They also had to handle the job of discipling the children that dad had often done in most homes. These experiences were to have a major impact on American women.

Music

American music also went to war. Jazz restyled as swing music so as to seem less black was all the rage. The NAZIs supressed jazz as "degenerate" in Germany. In America it was all the rage. All the big bands like Less Brown, Tommy Dorsey, Glen Miller, and many others played it. Miller enlisted to bring his music to the troops. He was killed in a plane flight in the closing months of the War. During the war years music was a combination of patriotism and sentimentality. Music was on the radio. Many Americans also had record players. It was a family item. Kids at the time did not have such items in their own rooms. Again they could be quite sizeable. They all played 78-rpm records which were very breakable. The RCA Victrola was particularly popular. Generally American servicemen wanted to hear American music. The one exception was the German song, "Lili Marlane". Popular American songs included: "Praise the Lors and Pass the Amunition," "The White Cliffs of Dover," "Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree with Anyone Else But Me," and "Till I Come Marching Home." Some important classics came out of the War like "White Christmas" reflecting the desire of servicemen to be back with their family for Christmas.

Magazines

War news was reported in local newspapers. There were also a number of magazines that brought the War into the American living room. There was no television and radio could not begin to convey the grim brutality of war. Two magazines more than any other provided a view of the War because of their focus on photographic images--Life magazine anf Time.

Movies

Hollywood along with the rest of the country went to war in December 1941. There was already a great deal of anti-NAZI and Japanese sentiment in Hollywood even before America entered the War. Films like "Casablanca" and "???" were made before Secember 1941. Moving going was much more common in the 1930s and 40s. Many Americans got their news in the Newsreels, which were shown between before and after the feattures along with animated cartoons. One estimate indicates that one-quarter of the 1,500 films made during the War years were combat related. They also showed short Government public service films. The movie stars that did not actually go to war (Clark Gable, Jimmy Stewart, and others) fought the Japanese and NAZIs on film (Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, and others). Even Dinald Duck, Buggs Bunny, and other beloved cartoon favorites engaged the eneny. Especially popular were movie serials included Captain Marvel, Spiderman, Batman, and Spy Smasher who did their best in the War effort.

Toys

One of the casulties of war most affecting children were toys. Japn was a major priducer of toys and of course that stopped. Germany had been an important touy profucer, but I believe that German toy shioments had declined in the 1930s as the NAZIs directed war production to war. (This needs to be confiemed. Soon after Pearl Harbor the Government stopped the production of all toys made from metal and rubber. Production was not resumed until after the Japanese surrender in September 1945. Some toy companies duiverted priduction to War goods. Other closed or went out of business. Metal was a major component of most toys in the 1940s. Favorite items like bicycles and trikes, wagons, ice skates, sleds with metal runners, rubber squeak toys, model railroads, and others were unavailable. Even worse, you could not even get replacement tires for the existing bucycles and trikes. There wee a lot of well patched bike tires during the War. The only toys avavilable were made of wood, paper, or cardboard. There were some plastic toys, but plastic was not yet a major material for toys and because it was petro-chemical based was also it sgort supply. Girls had itvsomewhat easier than boys during the War. Dolls, which were made of composition sawdust and glue, were less affected by production cuts. Children were resourceful and used their imaginations. Often scraps items were used to play war games targetting backyard NAZIs.

Play

I'm not sure to what extent girls' play was affected by the War, but boys' play was changed amost over night. Boys in the 1930s might play cowboys and Indians or cops and robbers. After Pearl Harbor it was warfare full tilt. I know in the late 1940s and 1950s this was still the case, at least until Davey Crockett appeared on television about 1956. I know that among my friends the popular target was the Germans. I am not sure that this sas the case during the War as Pearl Harbor may have inspired a desire to fight the Japanes. That certainly was the case fofr the public at large that wanted to focus on the Japanese in contrast to the war planners who from the very beginning adopted a Germany first policy.

Parades and Demonstrations

We notice a variety of parades in America. There were many at the beginning of the War after Pear Harbor. They were often associated with scrap drives for metal, rubber, fat, and paper. During the War Memorial Day an 4th of July commonly involved parades which took on new meaning during the War. And there were parades after the War when the service men began coming home. They varied greatly from community to community, but most cities and towns had parades of various dimensions. Often Scouts participated in the parades. After the War the major participants were the returning servicemen. One of the most famous photographs of the War were taken when the Japanese surrender was announced. A photograph of a sailor kissing a woman on Times Square in New York.







CIH -- WW II







Navigate CIH World War II Section:
[Return to Main American World War II home-front page]
[Return to Main American 1940s page]
[About Us]
[Aftermath] [Biographies] [Campaigns] [Children] [Countries] [Deciding factors] [Diplomacy] [Geo-political crisis] [Economics] [Home front] [Intelligence]
[Military forces] [POWs] [Resistance] [Race] [Refugees] [Technology] [Totalitarian powers]
[Bibliographies] [Contributions] [FAQs] [Images] [Links] [Registration] [Tools]
[Return to Main World War II page]
[Return to Main war essay page]
[Return to CIH Home page]




Created: 12:30 AM 10/21/2008
Last updated: 6:33 PM 1/27/2018