Hi, my name is Mary Smith and this is my story. It is January 1940,  I am a mother of three children, William (14), Thomas (13), and Alice (11), and my job is to take care of the children and the home. We live in a single story home in Dallas, Texas. My husband, Robert, works in the Insurance Business, so he tends to be out all day, only to come home for dinner and bed. My usual day consists of cleaning the home, laundry, dishes, cooking, taking care of the children, and making sure the house felt like home. I don’t usually see my husband very often because he is always at work, and I usually have the children out of the house until dinner, to make it so I can take care of the house. By the time Robert gets home from work, which is usually around 8, he is exhausted. He just wants to eat dinner and go to bed. It is challenging for the kids to connect with Robert because of the lack of time they are able to spend with him, so they have grown a much greater relationship with me and eachother. 

From day to day, the kids spend their time playing outside with the neighbors and eachother. I usually have them out of the house from the time they get home from school to the time the street lights come on. Occasionally I have them come home earlier to help me with dinner or to get some work done around the house, but I prefer them away, having fun with the neighborhood children. That way I can have a quiet and peaceful house to clean. On the weekends, I take the kids to the grocery store to pick up the necessities for the following week, this way Robert can have some time alone to settle after his long week of work. Robert usually has a lot of meetings with peers over the weekends, so he is usually gone then as well. The weekends are also the time for the kids to get a lot of their studying done. They have to sit at the kitchen table until they are done with their homework, this way if they need help, I can try to answer questions they have, and so I know they are getting their work done. Usually I will have the radio turned on, to hear what is going on in the news, while they are working.  Just the other day, I heard an announcement from Congress about the passing of the Selective Service Training and Service Act. It was talking about how it authorized the US Government to draft 900,000 men between 25 and 36 year of age for defensive purposes. I ran to tell my husband about it, because it was very shocking. Robert being 34, was concerned as well, he knew he was at the age where he could get drafted. What am I supposed to do if Robert gets drafted?! 

My husband and I had talked about what would happen if he were to get drafted, but he explained that we are still peaceful in this war, and they are just doing it as precautionary measures. I felt a bit better about the situation, and went back to cleaning up dinner. My husband started to get ready for bed, and the children were finishing up their homework. A few days later I reached out to a few of my neighbors, to talk about the announcement made by the government earlier. Everyone was shocked and confused about why they had passed the act while America was still peaceful. All of us were concerned about what would happen next, but went back to our day to day lives. In September, a message came out stating that all men between the ages of 25-36 were required to register with the Resurrected Selecttive Service System. In December, Robert received a message from the Selective Service System saying he was accepted into the system. We were in shock! What now?!

As more information arised about the Selective service System, the more worried I get. They said that the Selective Service System Act expired in march of 1947. Does that mean Robert is going to be gone for 7 years?! Then more information comes out explaining that they need more men to join, so they are extending the draft. “How many more people do they need”, I asked myself. I met with a few of my neighbors for a walk, and we were talking about what we are going to do. We are all dependent on our husbands income, how would we support the family while they are gone?! We all agreed that if nothing else, we would help eachother to support our families. When Robert had to leave, he told me that everything was going to be okay and he shouldn’t be gone for too long. He reminded me that this was just a precautionary measure and he doesn’t think that it will lead to anything serious. As time went on, I was getting worried, I only would hear from my husband through letters he had written, which was about every 2 weeks. Me and a few neighbors, met again on a walk to talk about how it has been without our husbands. We were all doing fine, but worried about our husbands. What if something happens to them? Or what if they don’t come back? Were questions running through all of our minds. What if they are gone for a long period of time, how are we going to pay for the house and support the children? There were so many questions. 

In December of 1941, I had heard on the radio that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. “What does this mean?”, I thought to myself. “Would we now take part in the war?” I asked myself. “Will Robert have to go fight in the war?” All I could do was wait for more information to come out, and hope Robert will be okay. As more information came out, I became more worried. I heard that we are moving towards war, the attack on Pearl Harbour was the turning point for America joining the war. The nieghbors and I met again, to discuss whether or not we are going to look for jobs. We knew that we weren’t going to be able to survive on the money that our husbands had left for us, if this continues, so we had to figure out a steady income. As time went on, the government was trying to get more men drafted for war, which required people to take their positions, in order to release them to war. 

In 1943, a political campaign came out called “Rosie the Riviter”, it was popularized all over the country. Whenever I went to the store to get groceries, I would see posters with her on it, I was confused at first, as to what it meant, but I later heard on the radio what it meant. The government had been making these political campaigns to ask women to step into these mens roles in order to allow them to join the military. The government needed women to step into these roles if they were going to keep a successful economy while the war was occuring. Many women worked in factories to help produce tanks for the war. They also took roles as truck drivers, to transport goods, which helped keep the flow of goods around the country. Women also play roles as nurses, to help keep hospitals in order, and to support those who will be on the front line. The other main job they had was fixing airplanes. This allowed the military to focus more on their training, rather than making sure all of their equipment was in order. Women really helped keep everything in order and running smoothly. 

I had chosen to become a nurse because I knew I needed a steady income, and I felt like that was the job I would understand the most. In the beginning, I was being trained on what I needed to do everyday, so that I would be able to care for my patients, and potentially help soldiers on the front line, if it gets to that point. It was challenging, but so fulfilling to watch my patients get better. It was interesting, there were so many people that I saw everyday, and I was super busy all of the time. And I was able to connect with a lot of my patients, which was awesome, because as they got better, I was able to celebrate their healing with them. Though I was a bit concerned about the children though. They had grown such a great connection with me because I was home all of the time, and now that I am working, I feel like our relationship might deplete like Roberts did with the children. What was I supposed to do? It is really satisfying to work as a nurse, but I love my children and don’t want to lose the connection I have with them.  

After work, I decided to take the children to a drive in movie. We didn’t actually drive there because it was just down the way, but we took blankets and laid under the stars to watch the movie. I think the children really enjoyed the movie, as did I. When the movie was over the children told me that it was so much fun and they wanted to do it again sometime soon. I was so glad that they really enjoyed the movie and hopefully they enjoyed spending time with me as much as I enjoyed spending time with them. The next day, I went off to work, the children went off to school, and Robert was still gone. It has been difficult for me to adjust to Robert being gone this long, I haven’t seen him in months, and it has really affected me and the children. At dinner, the children asked me when Robert was gonna come home, and I was lost for words. What was I supposed to say? They knew almost as much as me, the most information I got is from Robert's letters he sends. I told them it wouldn’t be much longer, but that he was helping our country. They appeared in disbelief, I assume because he had been gone for so long, they thought he wasn’t going to come back.  I tried to reassure them that he had just been sent as a precautionary measure, and he would be back very soon. In the hopes that they will believe me more than I believe myself. 

The next day, it was a Friday in June, 1942, like any other day, the children had school and I had work. While I was at work, I overheard some of the staff talking about something they had heard on the radio, it sounded very serious. So when I was on my lunch break, I turned on the radio to see if I could find what they had been talking about. There was always a thought running through my mind that we were going to war, especially after Pearl Harbor had been attacked, until today, I just had assumed it was just a worry. When I turned the radio on, they announced news of the British defeat at Tobruk, at the hands of General Erwin Rommel. The government needed to figure out a way to help Britain, and the most sensible thing they found, which would give US more power was to invade North Africa.