Putting today’s financial hardships into perspective

Last week this column tried to compare the rough financial times many of our citizens are facing today to another time in our history. Understanding other difficult periods may help all of us to keep things in perspective. The years of World War II were selected because that takes us far enough back to a time that few people today are old enough to remember clearly, but recent enough that much has been written by people many of us knew on how it really was “on the home front.”

Today, most people receive unemployment insurance payments and may qualify for such things as food stamps, Badger Care (insurance), technical school training or retraining and other services to help individuals and families make the best of difficult times. As this column is being written, yet another unemployment extension was being debated by the United States Congress.

Yet there is no question that, even with good “safety nets” available, if you have no job or your job is minimum wage and you are short of money – this is a terribly difficult time.

Times were also difficult during World War II. When the war began, the nation was just coming off the Great Depression. Millions of young men and women went off to war and, as a result, on the home-front jobs became abundant. But wages were all but frozen, rent increases were limited or disallowed and homes were not being built. Few cars for civilian use were being made or sold (65 cars and 21 bikes were produced for Sheboygan County in all of 1942), food, gasoline, and many other products were rationed. Most cities organized Block Captains who had safety plans ready in case of attack or natural disaster, but they also kept eye out so that the rules were followed.

If you were of German background (especially if you spoke mostly German) or Japanese background you could easily become suspect. Many Japanese Americans were sent to internment camps. Even, as one Sheboygan County pheasant hunter found out when he got back from South Dakota, making your own fuel for the trip was not allowed. For much of the war, it was not legal to drive for pleasure.

With the war in progress, hundreds of area wives were left back home to care for the children. To save money and share child-care duties, many women moved back to live with family members; that arrangement also allowed them an opportunity to work and earn needed dollars.

Throughout the war, paper and metal collection drives took place on a regular basis, as did War Bond Drives that involved nearly every family. People were encouraged to “support the war effort.” Training was also encouraged, and on May 2, 1941, a First Aid Class drew some 1,100 people who signed up for a Red Cross Class. This group was the first of 4,000 who were trained.

Sheboygan County had its first “blackout” – reported a success by the Sheboygan Press on Aug. 13, 1942.

The county ranked first in Wisconsin on Nov. 3, 1942, after it collected 19,522,950 pounds of scrap iron.

Local newspapers reported that if you wanted to qualify for additional gas rations, ride-sharing was mandatory.

The United States Agriculture Department agreed to remove restrictions on bakers slicing bread for home use (it had saved on bread packaging and kept bread fresher longer).

Ice cream was allowed because it was considered an important wartime food, allowing for maintaining nutrition and health standards.

News items: The ban on pleasure driving may be lifted in Wisconsin in the near future (Sheboygan Press, June 8, 1943). Horse meat is now available in Sheboygan County; no ration stamps needed (July 30, 1945). With rationing, cigarettes will be limited to 15 cigarettes per day (Sheboygan Press, January, 1945). Mayor Sonneburg of Sheboygan has received orders from the War Production Board to restrict outdoor lighting displays to save energy for the war effort (Sheboygan Press, 1945).

Just as it was not easy for those living during the war years with its many tough restrictions, it is not easy for the many today who are unemployed or under-employed. A key to the success in the effort during World War II was that large numbers of people worked together to endure and to get things done.

Most of this column material came from the book “On the Home Front,” published in 2009 by the Sheboygan County Historical Research Center.

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