Women's Role in Prewar and Postwar America

War often plays a tremendous part in the transformation of gender roles, not only on a military front but also on the civilian side. The wars of the 20th century revolutionized the roles that women were to have in society; these wars were a considerable element in the advancement of women’s rights in America. World War II especially changed the way that women functioned in a wartime and postwar environment. The period after World War II would continue to redefine the way women were perceived in the military, in the workplace, and in the political arena and would lay the groundwork for the furthering of women’s rights in the decades to follow.

In the early 19th century, the few women that did work outside the home were often employed in domestic jobs, such as housekeepers, maids, and cooks. In the late 19th century, some women were often forced to seek employment in the advancing industrial age, but at lower wages and sometimes worse conditions than men. Women continued on in this way until the start of World War I, when they took a more active part in the military and in the workforce to replace the men away at war (1). During World War I, women played a large part in replacing men in their abandoned jobs, filling positions in the railroads, machine shops, steel mills, ammunition factories and airplane factories, as well less industrial jobs at hotels, theaters and banks. In the military, women often worked as nurses. After the war ended women were quickly replaced in the jobs by men as they transitioned back to the home, although some women did remain in the work force. The tremendous effort made by women during World War I was not completely overlooked, however. Women’s effort in the war was rewarded with the 19th Amendment, ratified in 1920 – women were now finally given the right to vote.

In the years heading into World War II, women were once again mainly in the home, taking care of their families. Although more than pre-World War I, women were still a minimal part of America’s workforce and those in the workforce only did so out of necessity. The 19th century belief that women were not capable of dealing with the tough world outside their homes because they were sensitive and fragile was still a commonly held belief (2). As jobs became vacated by men going off to war, women once again rose to the occasion, some taking jobs in heavy industry while others signed up to join the military. These women did so often under threats of divorce and disownment by family – mail read by censors during this period to various female relatives threatened them with these two actions if they were to enter the military or go into the workforce (3). Susan B. Anthony II wrote during the war that “the conditions of war are definitely pulling women out of the house into the world. The peace must not push them back into the house unless they wish to go there” (4).

As women entered the industrial workforce in massive numbers, they came to the attention of the unions in their various fields. Before the war, the unions, such as CIO, paid minimal attention to the needs and concerns of women in industry but as their numbers swelled, it became impossible to completely ignore them. Overall, the number of female union membership quadrupled during the war years (5). UE & UAW hired more female staff than ever before and encouraged female union members to seek positions in leadership. UE President Fitzgerald pushed for women to strive for leadership, noting that, “Unless we develop the proper leadership, unless we encourage women to take an active part in the affairs of our organization, the men of this union are going to find themselves in a position where the structure of the union will be weakened” (6). However, even as women were urged into leadership positions and began taking a larger part in voicing their concerns, there was still a sexual division among the union staff. On one occasion, female members were even required to cook and serve dinner for the male members after a union meeting (7). Concerns of female union members that were considered female concerns were also largely ignored; women were welcome to be a part of the union but they had to accept the terms previously defined by men. The union was more concerned with keeping male union members interested in union activities and dealing with their concerns first, as James Burswald, of Local 329, stated, “Our first interest is interesting male members in union activity since women very likely will not be employed in our shop after the war” (8). This became increasingly true as the war came to a close and a ‘normal’ workforce was reestablished; women were no longer pushed to seek higher, leadership positions in the union and women’s power in the union quickly eroded.

When these women reentered the workforce, it was understood that the jobs they were filling during war time were only temporary positions because of the scarcity of employable men. The women fully intended to return to their homes, husbands and housework once the war was over but experience and economic reasons would begin to change their minds. When polled, 2/3 of employed women said that they intended to continue to work or seek employment after the war (9). In an effort to help get women back to their place in the family, many services offered during the war became unavailable to women after the war. Childcare centers opened during World War II that allowed mothers to work began to shut down immediately after VJ day; working mothers would not see this kind of assistance again until the 1960s (10). Women were considered essential to family survival and stability even by the government and although democracy, in contrast to patriarchy, within the family was a positive, this was not meant to say that the sexes were equal in a cultural aspect. Even educated women working as professionals in sociology and family believed that once married, a woman’s place was at the home because marriage and a career were incompatible. All of this made it difficult for women to challenge these social inequities without appearing seditious. Although working class women’s organizations would try to oppose this, their common sense, matter of fact messages did not stand a chance against family and child professionals (11).

Advertisers also took an active role in persuading women that their job was keeping a home. These advertisers encouraged ‘dreaming’ by both men and women – dreaming of a new home, with modern appliances and other simple luxuries that they could have. This plan would eventually backfire because, after a rest period immediately following the war, these women would reenter the workforce because they wanted to maintain a standard of living that one income would not always support (12).

As the war in Europe ended, American women workers began to immediately feel the effects. The number of women employed after VE Day decreased by four million, from 19,500,000 to 15,500,000. However, the men employed in the factories used for essential war needs were also losing employment, although in smaller numbers (13). Millions of women were now not only unemployed but widowers as well and found it hard to cope with raising children and making ends meet. These women struggled to pay the bills and were often forced to return to live with parents, grandparents or find roommates. Other women eager to work were turned away by former employers Nona Pool wanted to continue her work as a welder but was turned away when the guy said, “Oh, I wouldn’t doubt that you’re a good welder, but we don’t have the facilities for women” (14). Other women, like Ottilie Gattuss even wrote to President Truman saying, “I happen to be a widow with a mother and a son to support… I would like to know why, after serving a company in good faith for almost three-and-a-half years, it is now impossible to obtain employment with them. I am a lather hand and was classified as skilled labour, but simply because I happen to be a woman, I am not wanted” (15). Women discharged from military service arriving home suffered similar problems; having learned specialized skills but no longer employed by the government, they were forced to accept menial jobs below their skill level if they were single. If they had a family, they were “supposed to take up with the dishes and dusting right where she left off” (16).

Women were not entirely barred from the workforce, though. The ones that managed to stay employed moved from industrial jobs to more white collar jobs. Women would begin to take over office jobs that were once considered men’s jobs. Women were also employed in the FBI for similar tasks, at an increase of five times the previous total. The former Rosie the Riveter transformed herself into Wendy the White Collar Worker (17).

Politically, women did not pursue the possibilities that came after the war. Women were not supposed to show anger in public and this would handicap their effectiveness in the political arena. However, women were often put in charge of working for peace postwar because it was her duty to do so and women were suited to the task (18).

Because of the war, women learned that they could do things that they had never considered and work in jobs that they would have thought impossible to do. They learned things about their own capabilities and their importance; they earned medals for bravery, suffered from ridicule, and acquired important skills. They had been called by their government and they did not fail. The new self-image of these women whether they returned home or continued on in the workforce laid the foundations for the women’s liberation movements of the 1960s and helped the women of today reach even higher positions than ever before.

---

Notes

1. Doris Weatherford, American Women and World War II, (Oxford: Facts on File, Inc, 1990), 308.

2. Brenda Lewis, Women at War: The Women of World War II - At Home, at Work, on the Front Line, (London: Amber Book, 2002), 21.

3. Ibid., 22.

4. Susan B. Anthony II, "Out of the Kitchen - Into the War," American Women in a World at War, ed. Judy Barrett Litoff and David C. Smith (Plymouth: SR Books, 1997), 217.

5. Ruth Milkman, "American Women and Industrial Unionism during World War II," Behind the Lines: Gender and the Two World Wars. Edited by Margaret Randolph Higonnet, Jane Jenson, Sonya Michel and Margaret Collins Weitz. (London: Yale University Press, 1987). 168.

6. Ibid., 173.

7. Ibid., 172-175.

8. Ibid., 176.

9. Doris Weatherford, American Women and World War II, 307.

10. Sonya Michel, "American Women and the Discourse of the Democratic Family in World War II," Behind the Lines: Gender and the Two World Wars. Edited by Margaret Randolph Higonnet, Jane Jenson, Sonya Michel and Margaret Collins Weitz. (London: Yale University Press, 1987). 154.

11. Ibid., 155-157.

12. Doris Weatherford, American Women and World War II, 312.

13. Ibid., 307.

14. Brenda Lewis, Women at War: The Women of World War II - At Home, at Work, on the Front Line, 248.

15. Ibid., 248.

16. Doris Weatherford, American Women and World War II, 111.

17. Ibid., 108.

18. Ibid., 315-316.