“Back Home in Indiana.” 2005. Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites. 20 April 2006. http://www.in.gov/ism/MuseumExhibits/WWII/backHome.asp .

• “World War II plays a critical role in Indiana 's evolution. It brings fundamental changes to the state's economic, social and political landscape, fueling trends that continue even after the guns fall silent.” S-top
• Steel, rubber, gasoline, sugar, coffee, meat, shoes, and stockings were rationed.
• Clothes were redesigned to use as little fabric as possible.
• Wartime lifted Indiana out of the poverty created during the Great Depression.

Carnes, Mark C. and John A. Garraty. The American Nation: A History of the United States.11th ed. United States: Pearson Longman, 2003.

• About 15 million men and women entered the armed forces.
• Roosevelt’s greatest accomplishment- instilling a sense of patriotism and national purpose in industrialists, workers, and farmers
• Manufacturing output nearly doubled, and agricultural output rose 22% from 1939-1945
• New army camps in South and Southwest helped their per capita to move closer to the national average
• Unemployment virtually disappeared throughout course of war
• Civilian workforce increased by nearly 7 million
• Marriage rate rose steeply during war (75 per thousand women in 1939 to 118 in 1946)
• Many husbands objected to their wives taking jobs
• Breakthrough occurred when Detroit automobile manufacturers agreed to employ women on their wartime production lines. Soon, many more doors opened for them.
• Many families moved to centers of war production, such as Detroit and southern California (cramped quarters, ration books, absence of friends and relatives, outdoor toilets)

Denny, Mary. Personal Interview. 23 April 2006.

• Married at the beginning of the war
• Husband worked at a camp in Georgia as an x-ray technician
• Forced to live in cramped, 2-room quarters with a small refrigerator in the bathroom
• Worked in the post office when return to Indiana
• “equal pay for equal work”

Morgan, Helen. Personal Interview. 23 April 2006.

• Age 17 when Pearl Harbor was bombed
• All the boys in the town wanted to go fight in the war, but few actually went
• Worked in several jobs throughout the war
• Faced discrimination by men who believed she wasn’t capable of working

O'Grady,  Kathy. "What Did You Do in the War, Grandma?"  1995. Brown University. 18 April 2006. < http://www.stg.brown.edu/projects/WWII_Women/Grandma.html> .

• The War changed women’ perspectives.
• "I think for girls and women, and perhaps boys and men, of my generation the war forced them to grow up prematurely. It made them far more serious about the bare realities of life: life, death, values. It robbed them, in a sense, of some childhood." (Nancy Potter) S-top
• Discrimination against women in the workforce (Men worked in higher-paying manufacturing jobs while women did clerical work.)
• Women changed with the feeling of freedom in making their own money. They began to feel a sense of personal power.
• “Rosie the Riveter - Created by Norman Rockwell in 1943, the character "Rosie" was a sandwich-munching, brawny, yet innocent-looking woman in coveralls, cradling her rivet gun in her lap, goggles pushed up onto her forehead. Rockwell's "Rosie" is an admiring tribute to the more than 6 million women who entered the job force during the war, many of them taking up positions in what was considered "man's work," including the defense industries. However, the image was destined to last only as long as the war.”
•  “Rosie the Riveter” S-bottom
• War movies Since You Went Away and Mrs. Minivers show strong women taking care of the war effort at home. Movies like Double Indemnity and Gilda imply that newly liberated women are out of hand.
• Women wrote letters to soldiers and attended USO dances.

ThinkQuest. WWII – The Homefront. 19 April 2006. http://library.thinkquest.org/15511/ .

• “One front and one battle where everyone in the United States – every man, woman, and child – is in action. That front is right here at home, in our daily lives.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in address to the nation, April, 1942) S-top

Wikipedia – The Free Encyclopedia. World War II. 17 April 2006. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_war_2 .

• Ministry of Food created a system of rationing, where people registered with their local shops and were given ration books containing coupons.
• Clothing and petrol were rationed as well.

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