• Neutrality Acts of 1935, 1936, 1937– Isolationistic influence

• Neutrality Act of 1936– “Cash and Carry”

• Selective service act of October1940– Peacetime draft– Conscientious Objection

• Lend-Lease Act 1941– Economic declaration of war on Germany

}

Terms and Forms of

Aid to Allied powers

Robyn Weiner

• Office of War Information (OWI) 1942– organized the distribution of war information

to the public to help create means of understanding the war

• War Production Board (WPB) 1942– Oversaw industrial transformation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eoE12ywDzA&feature=related

• Office of War and Mobilization 1942– supervised efforts to distribute proper

materials for converted industries, regulated production of civilian goods, established production contracts, negotiate organized labor, and controlled inflation

• Woman’s Army Corps (WAC) 1943– provided secretarial workers, truck drivers,

instructors, and lab technicians

• War Bonds are technically a personal loan to the US government

• They are used to remove money from circulation and in turn reduce inflation

• Offered in denominations $25 up to $10000, with limitations

• Sold at 75% face value

Erik Mahal

• First called defense bonds until December 7 1941

• Many famous celebrities of the time were contracted by the government to sell War Bonds

• The celebrity campaign netted over $838,540,000 worth of bonds

• Was sold to FDR by Henry Morgenthau

• Over 85 million citizens purchased war bonds• Totaling over 185.7 billion dollars• Sports teams events held special events • News Broadcasts (Kate Smith)• Civilian D-day when planes dropped posters• Norman Rockwell provided original art as

advertising

• Propaganda was believed at first to be useless by US government

• Robert E Sherwood and the Foreign Information Service determined that America needed to fight just as much with words

• Office of War Information than took over the Propaganda ideas

• Promoted US involvement, Military Enrollment, and War Bonds Sales

• John Houseman was the first producer of international US propaganda

• Very theatrical and intense until invasion of North Africa in 1942

• Tone was than calm news reporting rather than over the top

• Took more sobering stand point rather than alluding to enemy bestiality

• Germans maintained alluding method and back fired when war turned

• Cheapest and easiest media to produce• Leaned more towards facts rather than

imaginative • Norman Rockwell, Ben Shahn and other

famous artists of the time were contracted the government for their unique art styles

• War Bond Posters were most abundent

• Posters glamorized war• As well as the importance of the non-

traditional jobs for women• With 10 million men at war there was no way

we would be able to win the war with out the help of women

• Some posters use economic prosperity to get women into the work force

Niger Lively

• In 1944 when the war was at its highest over 19 million women was employed in the united state more than ever

• They didn’t allow women in combat, so women took the jobs that men did that put them on the field of combat and some times it came to them

• They used women pilots to support the air fair but they didn’t get recognized until the 1970s

• Women that served in the American military in world war 2:

• Army - 140,000 • Navy - 100,000 • Marines - 23,000 • Coast Guard - 13,000 • Air Force - 1,000 • Army and Navy Nurse Corps - 74,000

• About 1 million African Americans served in the war• Half served in Europe• A large number faced racial discrimination• Before the war the military maintain a segregated force• They where classified as unfit for combat and wasn’t allowed

on the front line • In 1941 that all change • Pressure from African American civil rights leaders persuaded

the government to set up all black combat units• It was and experiment to see if African Americans can

perform task on the same level as whites

• 84 Woodrow Crockett was a part of that• He was a Tuskegee airman, the first group of blacks to be

trained by the air force• He flew 149 missions in 1944-1945• When they reached 200 missions the never lost a bomber to a

enemy• Bill De Shields: he is a historian and the founder of the black

military history institute of America• He say the symbol of black participation was the “ double v”.

A victory of the enemy and a victory at home.• By the time the Vietnam war came in the 60s and 70s African

Americans did it all

• Two units from New Mexico were activated and dispatched to Philippine islands

• After Japan had attacked the pearl harbor and forced America into war

• Their forces attacked America’s position in the Philippines

• Fight with the Filipinos the made a great stand against the Japanese for three month

• It was said that they were the last ones to get down

• War contributed to increased prices and shortages in food, housing, gas, clothing, transportation– Standard of living decreased as a result– Increases in salary due to jobs created by the war did

not improve purchasing power of most citizens• Many Americans were unhappy that they had to

sacrifice so much– Wealthy lived luxuriously on products purchased on

the newly created black market

Jamie Campbell

• Wartime rationing: • Sugar: May 1942• Coffee November: 1942• Canned Goods: March 1, 1943 (Meat and butter later that month)

– Meat: 28oz. per person per week– Butter: 4oz. per person per week

• Gasoline Rationing (May 1941):• Stickers distributed based on use of the vehicle (i.e. for workers

commute, on the job use, pleasure, and emergency vehicles)– Labled “A” through “E” to indicate usage and amount of gasoline

allowed for purchase• Led to suspicion and scandal

• April 1943: the government declares 27 million workers "essential", forbidding them to leave their jobs

• Many union members who committed to a no-strike pledge held protests

• Protests concerned workers’ safety and working conditions

• Many were “walkouts”