Amazing Roles of Women in WWII
Daycare During WWII
I expected to read that childcare during that period employed corporal punishment to discipline children but I learned otherwise!
Nationwide, by mid-1944, only about 3,000 child-care centers were operating, with a capacity of around 130,000 children. California served 25,000 children during the war.
In the Richmond, California, area (serving the Kaiser Shipyards), approximately 35 nursery schools of varying sizes were established during the war.
Many of the federally funded Richmond centers established for shipyard workers did not serve African American children. As a result, Black families in Richmond relied more on family networks, churches, neighborly help, and other informal or community-based arrangements rather than on the large, federally operated centers. Some of the workers’ children were found in cars and drugged with sleep medicine so the Black mothers could go to work. In California, Black children were enrolled in Oakland, Los Angeles, and San Diego. As a whole, in the United States, some childcare programs were integrated or segregated, while others offered no childcare options for Black working women.
Childcare during WWII
My interest in research on childcare during WWII grew because I owned and operated a licensed childcare center for 44 children, ranging from 0 (yes, 0 was the number on the license!) to 5 years old, from 1991 to 2007. I hired six staff members and had three separate rooms: Infant, Toddler, and Preschool.
I expected to read that childcare at that time used corporal punishment to make children behave, but I learned something quite different.
Victory Visitors!
These incredible volunteer women have been overlooked and forgotten. Have you ever heard of them? They went door-to-door in Richmond, CA, and other states and neighborhoods, and played a crucial role in recruiting “ordinary” housewives to help win the war effort during World War II. Women were needed to support the massive shipbuilding effort at the California Kaiser Richmond Shipyards. Victory Visitors single-handedly explained to housewives the urgent need for workers in the shipyards, factories, and offices. Most of the housewives had husbands who were already serving in the military. This personal contact approach was powerful because it made women feel directly needed and part of the national effort. The Victory Visitors framed...
The Unexpected Behind the Scenes…
The unexpected behind the scenes of producing my second book: She Built Ships During World War II. You will be quite surprised! After publishing She Flew Bombers, I became increasingly curious about the women on the Home Front during the war and what their experience was like. After conducting extensive written research, I sought to discover new information that I had never heard about before. I was interested in visiting the local Richmond, California, Museum, which was well known for information about women on the Home Front. I called the museum to find out the location and hours. I was astonished to learn that I needed to make an appointment. I had visited many museums in my life, but I was never told that I needed to make an...
WASP – Adeline Wolak Ellison
My interview with a Woman Airforce Service Pilot, Adeline Wolak Ellison in class 6, 1943 at the standing-room-only event on September 19, 2009, was hysterically entertaining. I found my previous interview with Betty Budde, Class 43-3 a hoot, but “Addie” really topped the cake with her funny true stories as a WASP and was candid and delightfully expressive. Please enjoy Addie Wolak’s interview: “It took a lot of work to be a WASP, but we did manage to have fun and had many crazy things happened to us. One of the funniest was when ten of us flew our brand-new BT 13’s from Texas and were scheduled to stop in Blithe, California overnight to have our instrument ratings checked and then fly off to deliver them to an army base. We got there and...
The Amazing Adventures of Alice Jean May Starr
The amazing adventures of Alice Jean May Starr (A.J.) serving in the Women Airforce Service Pilots during WW II class 4, 1943 and the tragic death of her classmate, Hazel Lee. “As a young child my farther took our family to the airport in New Jersey to experience the joy of watching the airplane take-offs and landings. I was fortunate to live during the time of Charles Lindbergh’s flight in 1927 then Amelia Earhart’s solo flight across the Atlantic in 1932. As a young woman I attended a lecture by Amelia Earhart at my local New Jersey high school and waited for Amelia to come out of the building and asked her for her autograph. In 1940 while I was in art school, I was so inspired by Amelia that I was determined to learn how to fly and...
Betty June Deuser-Budde
The interview at the standing room only event at the Santa Rosa vets building with pioneer aviator Betty June Deuser-Budde Class 43-3 at age 89 is a real hoot! Please enjoy her stories as a WASP. “I became fascinated with airplanes as a young girl when my father often took my family out to the local airport in Alameda, CA to watch the airplanes take off and land.” “In 1941, I earned my private pilot’s license thanks to a scholarship awarded by the Oakland Chamber of Commerce. I trained at an airport in Concord, California and obtained 50 logged in hours.” “I joined the third class of WASPs in January 1943 in Sweetwater, Texas. After graduating I was one of only three WASPs who were called to Washington, DC to meet with Director of the...
WASP Florence Emig Wheeler
The second presentation of former WASP Florence Emig Wheeler at the Santa Rosa Veterans building was very comforting for me. It was wonderful to have her on the panel as she had edited my book, She Flew Bombers. I introduced her saying, she was born on April 6, 1922 in Santa Clara, California, to William J. Emig the sheriff of Santa Clara County. Florence spoke with enthusiasm, “My interest in flying was sparked when my father encouraged me to join the San Jose State College flying club in 1940. Before I went into the service, I was a flight instructor in Reno, Nevada and Alturas, CA where five of my students were accepted into the WASPs, I felt very proud of that accomplishment. I joined the last class of WASPs in Sweet Water, Texas in...
Amazing interview of WASP Nancye R. Lowe Crout, 87 years old!
Interviewing the six WASPs that I was able to locate was fast approaching and I bought a dress that made me feel professional and added my mother’s string of pearls. The Sonoma County Arts council did all the publicity for the upcoming event. I was interviewed by several local radio stations plus a San Francisco station which enhanced my confidence to put on this event. On the eventful day I recruited my 3 close friends, Sivani, Kathy, and Amy for needed support at the event, and I was glad I did because the room was filled with capacity with standing room only! With butterflies in my stomach, my friends and I kept looking out the window anticipating the arrival of each of the WASPs hoping and wondering if they would all show up! Each of...
Grant from Sonoma County Arts Festival, The Birth of an Amazing Interview
After publishing She Flew Bombers, I joined the small friendly Healdsburg Literary Guild where we discussed events like doing readings at the old Healdsburg Cemetery on different holidays with the public was invited. At one of our meetings of only ten people, David Beckman, member of the Sonoma County Arts Council, invited me to apply for a grant for their upcoming event. Much to my surprise I received the grant and was full of excitement and formulated a plan to present the WASPs in a public event. This was new territory for me I had a BS degree in Health Education and was working to get a MS degree in Marriage, Family counseling. Besides the fact I owned a large Child Care Center license for 44 children and employed six childcare...