America's Time: The World War II Home Front

The Shock of Pearl Harbor and National Mobilization

• Initial Discovery and Household Reaction:
  • On a Sunday in December $1941$, Americans were engaged in routine activities. One resident recalls attending a double feature of westerns at The Plaza theater (a Saturday and Sunday tradition), where the film Guns of the Pecos was playing.
  • Others, like the narrator and his father, were in their living rooms listening to the Giants football game when a special news bulletin interrupted to announce the attack on Pearl Harbor.
  • Initially, some Americans were so unfamiliar with the geography that they mistook the location for Oregon.
• Casualties and Fleet Damage:
  • The Japanese air attack resulted in the deaths of over $2,000$ Americans.
  • Nearly half of the United States fleet was destroyed in the attack.
• The Transition from Isolation:
  • President Franklin D. Roosevelt (referred to by some as President Oswald in the transcript text) declared $12/07/1941$ as "a date which will live in infamy," noting the nation was "suddenly and deliberately attacked."
  • The attack ended American isolationism, requiring every man, woman, and child to join the war effort.
• Pre-War National Status:
  • In the early $1940s$, the United States was not yet a superpower.
  • The army was ranked $19th$ in the world, positioned behind Holland and Portugal.
  • The domestic industry was still reeling from the effects of a lingering depression.

Collective Fear and Early War Preparations

• Atmosphere of Vulnerability:
  • War news took days or weeks to arrive via newspapers and newsreels in the era before television and satellite transmission.
  • Domestic fears included Japanese submarines appearing in Santa Monica.
  • Four days after Pearl Harbor, Nazi Germany and fascist Italy declared war on the United States.
  • German U-boats were sinking tankers within sight of bathers on the beaches of Florida and New Jersey.
• The Rush to Enlist:
  • Young men rushed to recruiting stations. The Marine Corps was seen as the destination for the exceptionally brave, while most others joined the Army.
  • Personal accounts highlight fathers leaving for war, such as a manager of an IGA grocery store who went to Springfield, Missouri for basic training.
• Military Expansion:
  • The United States armed forces grew from $300,000$ in $1940$ to $15,000,000$.
  • Early news from the front involved a series of humiliating defeats by the Japanese in the first three months post-Pearl Harbor.

The Arsenal of Democracy and Industrial Transformation

• Presidential Communication:
  • On $02/23/1942$, the President delivered a radio address to rally the nation.
  • He asked citizens to follow his speech on maps; common practice involved marking newspaper maps with crayons to track the Axis powers.
• Detroit and Industrial Centers:
  • Detroit was dubbed the "Arsenal of Democracy."
  • The entire automobile industry was converted to war production in just $9\,months$.
  • Factories operated $24\,hours$ a day; bombs came off assembly lines every $5\,minutes$.
  • In Pittsburgh, steel mills ran at full blast, creating a red pulse in the night sky from the furnaces.
  • Workers produced Jeeps and other materiel in shifts lasting $18\,and\,24\,hours$.

Women in the War Effort

• Shift in Workforce Demographics:
  • Initially, factory owners resisted hiring women, fearing productivity loss and the distraction of men.
  • By $1942$ and $1943$, labor shortages necessitated the recruitment of women.
  • The number of women in war-related industries rose $460\%$ between $1940$ and $1944$, reaching $19,000,000$ (one-third of the civilian workforce).
  • Half of these women were wives and mothers who had never worked outside the home.
• Contributions and Roles:     Boeing's Seattle plant (half of whom were women) produced over $12,000$ B-17 bombers, known as the "Flying Fortress."
  • Women served in high-skilled roles, such as ABS welders wearing leather suits and acetylene torches to build ships.
  • Ship assembly time was reduced from $1\,year$ to just $17\,days$.
  • Factories produced $4,000$ tanks and $4,500$ planes every month.

Daily Life, Sacrifice, and Rationing

• The War Effort at Home:
  • Communities engaged in civil defense. Patrick Joseph Schein served as an air raid warden on Lancaster Street, shouting "lights out" in a rich Irish tenor.
  • Hollywood stars promoted war bonds to raise funds for ships, planes, and tanks.
• Rationing and Scrapping:
  • Gas rationing used A, B, or C stickers on windshields to dictate allowed fuel amounts.
  • Americans collected rubber, aluminum, and tinfoil. Children contributed rubber toys (e.g., a dog named Stuffy's favorite toy) and tin foil to the scrap drives.
• Portrayal of the Enemy:
  • Newsreels and government films fostered hatred, depicting the Japanese as "cockroaches, monkeys, beasts," or "subhuman."
  • Public sentiment reflected zero tolerance, with common phrases like "the only good one was/is a dead Jap."

Japanese American Internment

• Executive Order 9066:
  • The order mandated the removal of all persons of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast, fearing they might assist an invasion.
  • Approximately $120,000$ Japanese Americans were forcibly sent to $10$ internment camps.
• Personal Experiences of Exclusion:
  • A student recalls his classmates, George Murakami (who played George Washington) and his brother Roy, being sent away two weeks after a school play.
  • Camps such as Heart Mountain, Wyoming, were described as desolate locations surrounded by barbed wire, devoid of beauty or greenery.
  • FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover was a rare official who objected, calling the camps the result of "wartime hysteria."
  • The internment is viewed by historians as one of the greatest civil rights violations in US history.

Social Dynamics and Pop Culture

• The USO and Changing Rhythms:
  • Seattle served as a major port of embarkation. USO dance halls were filled with service members on their way overseas.
  • Teenage girls grew up more "precociously sexual" due to the reality that their boyfriends might never return.
• The Sinatra Phenomenon:
  • Frank Sinatra, kept out of the service by a broken eardrum, became a cultural idol.
  • The Army newspaper, Stars and Stripes, mocked the screaming female fans, noting that "mice make women scream too."
• The War through the Eyes of Children:
  • Children played at war constantly with wooden rifles and fence-post machine guns.
  • They attended serials at the East End Theater, Plaza Theater, and Liquid Theater, watching war movies like Wake Island, So Proudly We Hail, The Purple Heart, and Operation Burma.
  • During a screening of Bataan, a local child threw a golf ball at the screen to stop the Japanese onslaught, leaving a permanent patch on the screen.

The Reality of Death and the Gold Star

• Combat Casualties:
  • By the end of $1943$, American casualties surpassed $100,000$.
  • Letters from GIs often masked the truth, focusing on trivialities like dry socks to protect families from the horror of combat.
  • Families dreaded the knock of the Western Union man with a telegram.
• Personal Loss:
  • One woman recalls her husband, a B-24 pilot, being shot down near Benton, Germany. He was one of the last out of the plane, but his parachute failed to open because he was too close to the ground. Only $3$ out of $10$ men survived.
  • "Gold stars" were placed in windows to denote a family member lost in the war.

Victory in Europe and FDR's Passing

• The D-Day Invasion:
  • Planned under General Dwight David Eisenhower, D-Day ($06/06/1944$) was the largest military operation in US history.
  • Americans gathered to pray as Roosevelt led a national prayer printed in newspapers.
  • Paris was liberated two months later.
• The Death of Roosevelt:
  • Roosevelt campaigned for a fourth term in $1944$, famously defending his dog Fala against Republican accusations.
  • He died on $04/12/1945$ at his retreat in Warm Springs, Georgia, while posing for a portrait.
  • His body was transported by train to Washington DC as hundreds of thousands watched in tribute.
  • Harry Truman, Vice President for only $82\,days$, succeeded him. On $05/08/1945$, Truman announced the surrender of Germany.

The Atomic Bomb and the End of the War

• The Manhattan Project:
  • A secret project involving $160,000$ people across $37$ sites.
  • The weapon was tested on July 12 and used less than a month later.
• The Final Ultimatum:
  • In July 1945, the Allies met at Potsdam, issuing an ultimatum of "unconditional surrender or utter destruction."
  • Fear of suicidal kamikaze attacks led military planners to anticipate massive casualties during a land invasion of Kyushu, where a million Americans (including soldier Paul Fussell) were preparing to attack.
• Hiroshima and Nagasaki:
  • On $08/06/1945$, the Enola Gay dropped the first atom bomb on Hiroshima.
  • A second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki $3\,days$ later.
  • Japan surrendered on $08/15/1945$.
• Legacy and the Cold War:
  • $02/2000$ (as noted in transcript) Americans died for the victory.
  • $11,000,000$ veterans returned home.
  • The pre-war innocence was replaced by new anxieties; on the day of surrender, neighbor Mrs. Siro remarked to her neighbor that the next war would be with Russia.