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Essential Question : How did the U.S. mobilize civilians at home to help win World War 2 & what impact did this have on American society? Warm-Up Question : What other major American war is most similar in its resemblance to the U.S. entrance into WW2?.
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Essential Question: • How did the U.S. mobilize civilians at home to help win World War 2 & what impact did this have on American society? • Warm-Up Question: • What other major American war is most similar in its resemblance to the U.S. entrance into WW2?
The Home Front • WW2 impacted all aspects of American life: • FDR hoped the U.S. would be the great “arsenal of democracy” • The boost of wartime industry ended the Great Depression • The war altered the lives of women, African-Americans, Japanese-Americans, & Mexican-Americans
The Office of War Information directed press, print, radio, & film propaganda The power to create new gov’t agencies to censor the press Mobilization The Office of War Mobilization coordinated the draft, consumer prices, & the labor force to limit civil liberties & seize personal property • To win wars in Asia & Europe & meet civilian demands, the U.S. gov’t grew to its largest size ever: • The War Powers Act gave the president unprecedented power • New bureaucracies were formed to direct the economy, create propaganda, sell war bonds, & prevent enemy subversion The Office of Strategic Services gathered enemy intelligence & conducted espionage The U.S. gov’t spent $250 million per day from 1941 to 1945 This is 2x as much as all previous gov’t spending combined
Buy, Buy, Buy, Buy a Bond:It Will Lead to VICTORY! War bonds helped raise $187 billion to support the war effort
Propaganda: Fighting the Enemy on the Battlefield & on the Home Front
Hollywood Pitches In Jimmy Stewart goes off to war
The Wartime Economy U.S. made 2x more goods than Germany & 5x more than Japan • The most decisive factor for Allied victory was America’s ability to outproducebothGermany&Japan • Heavy industry was converted to war & was directed by the War Production Board (WPB) • 15 million U.S. soldiers fought but 60 million workers & farmers supplied them with supplies
Ford made one B-24 bomber every hour Ford’s Willow Run Factory
Henry Kaiser’s West Coast Shipyards The Allies won the Battle of the Atlantic, in part, because the USA produced ships faster than German u-boats could sink them Kaiser standardized battleship building & reduced the time it took to make a battleship from 355 days to 14 days
Essential Question: • How did the U.S. mobilize civilians at home to help win World War 2 & what impact did this have on American society?
Regional Changes • The war effort transformed the Western & Southern U.S.: • California became the major center for industry to support the war effort in the Pacific • 60 of the 100 new military based were built in the South • Southern textile factories & industrial jobs helped end sharecropping & tenant farming 9 million defense workers moved to new factories & shipyards in South & West
Women • The war presented new economic opportunities for women: • Dramatic rise in employment (14 million to 19 million by 1945) • Most new female workers were married, many middle-aged • Entered “exclusively male” fields • Temporarily redefined “woman’s sphere” from “just at home” “To hell with the life I have had. This war is too [serious], and it is too [important] to win it.”
Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES) Women’s Army Air Corps Pilots Join the Women’s Army Corps (WACs)
Families …and high divorce rates • The uncertainties of war & economic affluence of the 1940s led to a dramatic rise in marriage • The influx of women into the workforce led to a new demand for daycare centers & to an increase in child delinquency • Public health improved as more families had access to doctors, dentists, & prescription drugs
African-Americans Banned discrimination in defense industries & gov’t • 1 million blacks served in U.S. military but few saw combat • Discrimination in the workforce led A. Philip Randolph to pressure FDR to create a Fair Employment Practices Committee • Continued black migration into the North & West made race relations a national issue
Segregated units…again Tuskegee Airmen
Double V: Victory at Home & Abroad A. Philip Randolph threatened a “March on Washington” to protest war time discrimination Other groups, like the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), staged sit-ins in restaurants in major cities to protest discrimination
Mexican-Americans • Mexican-Americans: • Served in quasi-segregated military units, often in the most hazardous branches • Mexican-American workers found jobs in SW agriculture & west coast industry • Faced discrimination, especially during the Zoot Suit Riots
Japanese-Americans • Due to Pearl Harbor, many in the U.S. feared Japanese-Americans were helping prepare for a Japanese invasion in the West • Civil liberties were restricted: • Issei had their assets frozen • Used racial stereotypes (“Japs”) • In 1942, FDR ordered 112,000 Japanese-Americans moved to internment camps Japanese who were not American citizens living in the U.S.
Families were given one week to close their businesses & homes Japanese- American Internment Camps The all Japanese-American 442nd Division fought in Europe & received over 1,000 citations for bravery
Win-the-War Politics • In 1944, FDR used the war to strengthen his leadership: • “Mr. New Deal” had shifted to “Mr. Win the War” • Opponent Thomas Dewey made communism & FDR’s health the focus of the election • FDR switched VPs from liberal Henry Wallace to moderate Harry Truman to gain appeal