A Call to ArmsA Call to Arms
The demands put on American industry by the war machine were immense. With some ten million men at war and the rest of the male population at work, it was clear the only way America would be able to win the war was if it enlisted large numbers of women for employment. America needed it's women to go to work to build the planes, tanks, and ships needed to fight Hitler. World War II, more so than any other war, was a war based on production, and so it was time to bring American women into industry.
So the government teamed up with industry, the media, and women's organizations in an effort to urge them to join the labor force because telling women it was their "patritoic duty" to go to work. (Left- A propaganda poster. "Women in the War, We Can't Win Without Them" NWDNS -44-PA-233 - NAIL)But patriotism was not the only incentive that the War Manpower Commission used to lure women into the workforce. Many recruitment programs used the idea of increased economic prosperity to attract women into the workforce. In fact some posters went so far as to glamorize war work, as well as stress the importance women working in non-traditional jobs.
Still much of the propaganda of the time used emotional appeal paired with patriotism. Women were constasntly being reminded that their husbands, sons, and brothers were in danger because they were not receiving the supplies they needed. Slogans such as "Victory is in Your Hands," "We can do it!," and "Women the war needs you!" were all used to convince women that their country's need were more important than their individual comfort.
As a result of the propaganda American women, whether they were motivated by patriotism, economic benefits, independence, social interaction, or necessity, joined the workforce at never before seen rates. In July 1944, when the war was at it's peak over 19 million women were employed in the United States, more than ever before.
Leila Rupp, in her book Mobilizing Women for War points out that the posters and modes of advertisement used to mobilize women into the workforce stressed the temporary and vital nature of the situation. She points out that by suggesting that the current situation was only temporary it "allowed the public to accept the participation of women in unusual jobs without challenging the basic belief about women's roles."
A Poster from the "Produce for Victory" Series
Above Photograph courtesy Newsweek Magazine.
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But applying for a job was not necessarily as easy as it appeared to be. While their boys were fighting for equality and human rights abroad, American women were getting discriminated against at home. Though women were turning out for jobs at alarming rates, many employers refused to hire them (even though they had unmet labor requiements.) Some employers outrightly refused to higher women, while others set ridiculously low highering quotas for women, and still some agreed to employee women, yet they refused to offer them jobs previously "assigned to men." These practices left women feeling very confused as to how America wanted it's women to behave. Most people believed that men should be the sole breadwinner in the family, and as a result women were amoung the last hired in the early stages of the war.
(ABOVE) "Women are welders discuss the production
Men and Women work side-by-side
building bomber planes at at factory
in Willow Run, Michigan.
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Though several million women were highered, they were not necessarily treated the same as their male counterparts. In 1942, the National War Labor Board (NWLB) attempted to erase some of the long standing inequalities in women's pay, when they decided to employ an equal pay principle. According to the NWLB, women would be paid the same as men for the same or comparable work. However, these standards were seldomly enforced. Most emplyers thought that the traditional women's pay scale was acceptable, and some reasoned there was no need to make women's pay comparable to men's because women's work was easier. But this was far from the case. Women who joined the labor force as a result of World War II were often referred to as "production soldiers." Their standard work week was 48 hours, though many women frequently worked overtime, Sunday was their only day off, and most vacations and holidays were cancelled
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of motor mounts and welded parts
in a welding booth at the Inglewood, Calif.,
plant of North American Aviation, Inc.
The plant produces B-25 ("Billy Mitchell")
bombers and P-51 ("Mustang") fighter planes."
Though a popular example of a wartime woman worker "Rosie" did more than just "rivet." Women of all ages operated lare cranes which were used to move heavy tanks and artillery. Some women loaded and fired machine guns and other weapons to make sure they worked. Other women operated hydralic presses, while some worked as volunteer fire fighters. Some women who formerly worked as saleswomen, maids, or waitresses, took over more essential jobs such as welders, riveters, drill press operators, and taxi cab drivers. Women found themselves in participating in every aspect of the war industry from making military clothing to building fighter jets, American women worked day and night.
"Women take over the operation of some of the
heaviest machine tools at the Inglewood, Calif.,
plant of North American Aviation, Inc. Day and night,
shifts of girl employees use this huge hydraulic press
to form thousands of sheet metal parts forUnited Nations war planes."