Daily+Life+on+the+Home+Front

Prosperity And Popular Culture

- Families at home were constantly reminded about war. - They did their best to try to escape the war. - Going to baseball games and movies. - 7/10 Americans felt that they had not had to make any sacrifices because of the war. - 34% of Americans had a yearly income of less than $1000. - New jobs created by the war brought this percentage down to below 20% by 1945. - The population grew by 7.5 million between 1940 and 1945.

Money To Burn

- Americans were earning money like crazy. - They were earning more money then they needed for basic necessities. - They wanted to spend their money on new cars, trucks, and appliances, but because of the war these products were unavailable. - People bought books! - The new Pocket Book company, founded by Robert de Graff in1939. - Books were more widely available and at a low price. - 34,000 copies of his first book, "How to Win Friends and Influence People", were sold in 2 months. [] - Approximately 85 million Americans went to the movies each week during the war. just to get their minds off the war.

Baseball and Popular Music

- Did you know that 4,000 of the 5,700 major and minor league players were in the military services? - Americans still flocked to baseball games during the war. - There was even women ball players that also tooked the fields to lift the spirits of war-weary Americans. - A man named Philip Wrigley founded the first all american girls softball league, which became the all-american girls baseball league in 1945 []

-Many songs were written to inspire hope and patriotism. -"The Star Spangled Banner Waving Somewhere" was one of the best-selling records of 1942 and 1943. -"White Christmas" from the 1942 film Holiday Inn was the sentimental favorite for both for soldiers overseas and for people at home.

Shortages and Controls

-Even though Americans had money to spend they had to live with shortages and disruptions. -Zippers made of metal were used for guns, rubber for girdles went to tank and trucks, fabric for dresses became military uniforms instead. -Food was becoming very scarce, sugar, coffee, meat and countless other items were becoming very scarce. -Worried that shortages would lead to price increases. -Roosevelt created the Office of Price Administration (OPA) in mid-1941. -In the middle of 1942 the OPA began rationing.

Campaigns at home

-The goverment had to create a sense of patrittism and participation in the war ffort while convincing citizens to coserve precious resources. -In one campaign, americas were asked to save scrap metal and other materials that could be used for war machinery. -some of these maetals they saved tin cans, pots and pans, razor blades, old shovels, and even old lipstick tubes. -In Virginia collectors raised sunken ships from the James River; in Wyoming they took apart an old steam engine to use the part. -They even collected rubber: These rubbers they saved was rubber hoses, raincoats, and bathing caps. -gn They saved kitchen fats because the glycerin could be used to make powder for bullets or shells.

-Another campaign encouraged Americans to but saving bonds to finance the war. [] -In the spring of 1941, Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau, Jr, decided "to use bonds to sell the war, rather then vice versa." -Morganthau realized that selling war bonds would give peosple "a fnancial stake in American democracy an opportunity to contribute toward the defense of that demodracy." -These are some sayings that echoed throughout the United States, constantly reminding Americans of their patriotic duty in the wartime campaign. -Here are the somethings they said. "Play your part.", "Conserve and collect." "Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without."