Homefront (Reel 1, 1985)

what [Music] from 1941 to 1945 the United States was engaged in the greatest war in history 15 million American men went off to fight some to die in foreign [Music] lands but most people did not go overseas they experienced the war here at [Music] home for many it is still the central experience of their lives I think World War II was really a kind of an experience that was the good guys versus the bad guys it was very clear and everybody body's mind who was right and who was wrong I don't like the connection between God and War when people fight Wars they think God is on their side it's ridiculous World War II made me grow up World War II gave me a sense of belonging to the United States of America being very much a part of it and looking back over the years back to that period they were the happiest of times in some ways and in other ways the saddest very saddest it just changed my whole life and uh I know it's terrible to say that about the war but I can't remember anything that the war didn't do for me as a person inside this is the story of the American people during World War II how they lived what they thought and how they were forever changed [Music] now the crisis story on this side of the Pacific the Japanese envoys in Washington have arranged to confer with Secretary of State Cordell Hull at 11:00 tomorrow morning Japan's relations with the United States may come to a head tomorrow here's the crisis news as reported from the Far East danger points just Molly and me and baby makes three we're happy and M Blue [Music] Heaven it is the 12th year of the Great Depression by 1941 the worst is over yet a decade of hard times has worked its way into the very fabric of American [Music] society after years of unemployment the ordinary man feels lucky to have a job any job but the discouraging fact is that most jobs pay little and there's little hope for advancement now the American people dream of security not opportunity you see us melini's newspaper acknowledged that it seems probable that the United States but just as one National crisis recedes another more dangerous one is taking its [Music] place in news re Americans watch as Hitler's armies roll across one country after another by December of 1941 Hitler has conquered most of Europe and and invaded Russia now Americans believe it's only a matter of time before a greater German Empire threatens us the danger of war is even more immediate in the Far East Hitler's Ally Japan has invaded China all signs indicate that she's planning to attack Western bases in the [Music] Pacific the threats of another General War are increasing by the hour the American people know that war is coming they may not know why exactly but they know it will happen the only question is when no optimism Saturday December 6th will be the last day of peace in America the war that will come tomorrow will not be fought on American Shores but it will change forever the American way of life [Music] I was cutting out my daughter's Christmas program dress and suddenly my husband's Voice boomed through our laughter and said shut up keep still the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor the United States Naval Base in the Hawaiian Islands the next day President Franklin Delo Rosevelt addresses the nation December 7th 1941 a date which will live in infamy the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by Naval and Air Forces of the Empire of Japan I ask that the Congress declare a state of War 4 days later Germany declares war on the United States Italy the third axess power under Bonito musolini follows [Music] suit in the days and weeks that follow Americans on both coasts are braced for an attack unidentified planes are sighted everywhere false alarms are triggered by nervous officials panic and confusion set [Music] in on the West Coast there was this feeling that I gained really from the adults that the Japanese were going to actually go beyond the Hawaiian islands and attack the mainland citizens are told to cover their windows and extinguish all lights entire cities are blacked out to prevent enemy pilots from navigating over US [Music] Territory there were search lights of course most every night you could see them and they were really looking for planes that were coming over and a lot of people said that they saw them and I guess they did I got all my family we got in the center closet Center Hall rather so we felt like we had a little protection there I don't know what we were doing with that was the only place we had to go and it was really a horrifying experience no matter what our enemies in their desperation may attempt to do to us we will say as the people of London have said we can take it and what's more what's more we can give it back and we will give it back with compound [Applause] interest from San Francisco to New York enlistment centers for the Army the Navy and the Marines are immediately jammed with long lines of men men who have found their hearts eager to fight for this challenged Nation America's manhood marches its destination Victory we immediately went down to the Marine headquarters and had to stand into a very long line to try and enlist in the Marines when it came my turn to try and pass on in there was a man of the telephone who asked my name and he announced it into the telephone he told me to step out of the line that I was being drafted on the following Monday and sure enough on Monday I got my letter from the president of the United States saying greetings and on January 12th of 1942 I was in the Army the the war just turned the whole world upside down uh everything changed immediately from the smallest thing from the food you put on your table to your relationship with your own boyfriend most of my friends were connected with the National Guard and of course all the girls and fellas knew each other the girls discussed how fearful they were the men seemed to put on a very brave front and almost a happy front and then we all realized that this was probably the last time we were all going to be together good by Mama I'm off to yokahama for the red white and blue my country and you goodbye Mama I'm off to yokahama just to teach all those Japs the an are no saps a million fighting sons of Uncle Sam if you please we'll soon have all those Japs right down on their Japanese goodbye Mama I'm off to yah for my country my flag and you [Music] compared to her enemies the United States is unprepared for Modern War for several years the factories of Japan and Germany have been turning out vast quantities of weapons in World War II it is machines as well as men that will turn the tide of battle the war is a race to produce weapons and material and America is behind the United States must build planes and tanks and guns and ships to the utmost limit of our national capacity we must raise our sites all along the production line let no man say it cannot be done it must be done and we have undertaken to do it [Applause] but to produce for war the nation must stop producing for the consumer for weeks after Pearl Harbor the largest factories are still turning out cars and other civilian Goods to speed up the conversion process the federal government offers industry generous Financial incentives War contracts call for a guaranteed profit on each item produced I was working for General Motors AC spark plug Division and my area of responsibility was planning for manufacturing right after Pearl Harbor we got the signal that we should put our total efforts into conversion to war production the equipment that we were using was just not the type of equipment that you use for war Goods so these areas had to be gutted or stripped and the new equipment brought in produced the organs it was really a large scale complicated busy activity turning that plan around in fact we jokingly said and often true that you went through a door in the morning that wasn't even there in the afternoon months and years are being compressed into days manufacturers have switched from model trains to machine guns lipstick cases to cartridge shells lamps to bomb noses we worked 7 days a week three shifts a day there was no time off uh there was a Conant battle against a production schedule that just never stopped from the beginning of the project until the end of the war but speed and conversion are not enough America needs new plants new steel mills new airplane Factor the shipyards must be enlarged doubled and tripled in size war production will cost a colossal amount of money to meet the production needs of 1942 the the government will spend $53 billion now there are jobs plenty of jobs and at high wages too when I went to work in the Navy Yard after coming out of the shops in Pennsylvania it it just felt like that uh something came down from heaven that went from 40 cents an hour to a dollar an hour uh we had all the overtime we want and I felt like at last I'm getting up in the world the uh I was able to buy my clothes buy a suit uh buy some working clothes for a change and uh I didn't need to depend on somebody's hand me downs it just made a different man out of me it's a time of opportunity again in America it's a time of opportunity especially for the underclass for those was broken by the depression for those who have never tasted the fruits of America like the Aris and okis still traveling the route between Oklahoma and California still looking for work the West Virginia Hill folk leaving small farms where they made $300 a year cash there are Farm boys from Kansas Nebraska and Iowa Cowboys from Montana and the dtas cab drivers clerks and mechanics from New York and Boston the big money now is in the war plants everyone is on the Move heading for the money the Great Depression is over I'm no millionaire but I'm not the type to care cuz I've got pocket nearly 20 million Americans will pick up stakes and settle somewhere else during the war people are heading for the cities where the steel mills and factories are going up I wouldn't take the wealth to the shipyards on the coast to mobile norfol Philadelphia most of all they're heading out west to the aircraft plants and shipyards in Los Angeles San Diego Portland Seattle I've pocket full of dreams as workers stream in the defense towns are overwhelmed small cities like San Diego and mobile find their populations ding almost overnight life here is congested frantic exciting the Boom Town is America's new Melting Pot there was no industry around where we lived so in order for my husband and I both to have jobs we had to go to an industrial portion of the nation so we moved we all moved in so quickly that there wasn't housing we lived in storefronts we lived in converted garages but at the same time it was a complete learning process for me I met new people I learned different accents and I had to concentrate just a little more I like the way of life that it opened for me I saw people doing different things we went out a lot we went out to nightclubs now I had never been to a nightclub it was like a like a whole new world it opened up and I never went back I never wanted to go back the depression is over for some for others opportunity is still far away when blacks apply for jobs opening up in the defense Industries the answer is usually we're not hiring one company States the Negro will be considered only as janitors and another similar capacity in the defense plants and everywhere else in America the black is low man on the totem pole one of my first jobs when I arrived in Philadelphia it was as a butler in Chestnut Hill my second job I went with Philadelphia phom company as a labor I was not able to become a bus driver or dispatcher or anything in other departments they said they definitely did not want no blacks because they was inferior and they had a certain amount of disease and they smelt this everything that they could possibly say about a black fascism was not a monopoly of Hitler was not a monopoly of melini it was something that we saw every day on the streets of Baltimore and in other places that inconsistency was the fact that we were presenting ourselves as The Advocate spokesman um the defender of democracy and yet we were practicing the very reverse in home at home the black community did not see much sense in the war unless the war were tied to a commitment for change on the domestic scene there was a feeling that now is the time to make these changes and there was a recognition that if we don't change these patterns and employment fairly soon these industries that are looking for people will have the people they need however and blacks might still be outside the world today but racial discrimination is not a matter of national concern even those who say they're for social reform have turned their attention Elsewhere One war is enough to fight and no energy can be diverted from that goal and the war is now frighteningly close to American Shores German submarines are sinking American ships just a few miles off the east coast Coast sometimes at the rate of two or three a day and perhaps the boldest attack yet made upon American shipping an axis submarine has torpedoed a large Merchant vessel within a mile and a half of the mouth of the Mississippi River they have struck in the St Lawrence and several times in the Gulf of Mexico to the north and south of the Mississippi War news from the Pacific is even more alarming Allied outposts in the Far East are crumbling at a Japanese attack each month brings news of another major defeat or reversal the Japanese offensive against the Allied nations in the Pacific is driving ahead at increased speed tonight Americans are at a loss to explain the succession of defeats Time Magazine says the fate of the nation hangs in the balance exed by insufficient in April the American stronghold in the philppines falls to the Japanese the number of men involved on batan makes it one of the worst American rever in foreign war 36,800 American and Filipino soldiers face death or capture in the town of Maywood Illinois the loss of batan is felt dearly 5,000 men from the Illinois National Guard are killed wounded or captured on batan their names are posted on the Maywood honor rooll we have in our town today two mothers each of whom has given two sons Sons already and as I said before we'll give our sons we'll give our lives but by the help and grace of God we will not give up a free America or our Democratic way of [Applause] [Music] life America has now endured a half a year of defeat to boost public Spirit towns and cities across the country stage Victory rallies Spirit of the American people was never higher than it is today the union was never more closely in it together and this country was never more deeply determined to face the solemn tasks before it we pulled together and it was a feeling that I have never seen happen any other time in this country to this very day in it the B the broker the cowo the ster we're all in it the government urges everyone to participate in community war program by Spring of 1942 one out of every 10 Americans is involved in one program or another because I was 4f I couldn't be a general and I couldn't work down to a private so I figured what else can I do so the resolve it was that I went into civilian defense as an air raid Warden which is the first step civy locally I organized the first post that had a full demonstration of what air raid Warden should do and we had over 2,000 Spectators lined up all around the neighborhood we had these trucks running around throwing Fourth of July flares to uh imitate magnesium bombs things like that and then we'd have people faint pretend they were hurt it was up to us to take care of them until a medic would come along we had everybody from Brick Layers and janitors on up to stock Brokers like I was at the time and bankers we had housekeepers people in all all fields of endeavor it was very very easy to get one anyone to volunteer to help toward the war effort because that was the main effort in our all of our Lives was to end this war before it reached our Shores especially I was concerned learned about my son he hadn't finished high school when he volunteered anything that I could do I wanted to do and I did it junk ain't junk no more cuz junk can win the war what junk to you has a job to do cuz junk ain't junk no more pots and pans old garbage cans the kettle that doesn't pour collect for the USA Jun win the war Saturdays and after schools were always taken up with activities for the war effort uh and things like scrap drives and uh collecting tin and tin foil taking grease down to the butcher shop that whole idea of saving and rationing uh sugar was rationed gasoline was rationed that whole notion that it was saving lives overseas by us uh doing without Americans are asked to give till it hurts most of all are asked to give money money to buy war bonds bonds are helping finance the war Hollywood's most famous movie stars leave the film Capital to help the government sell war bonds and how that crowd lines up to buy bonds from their favorites they buy knowing that every dollar invested helps in more planes tanks and ships to the United Nations The Tall Man with a high hat will be coming down your way get your savings out when you hear him shout any bonds today any bonds today bonds of Freedom that's what I'm selling any bonds today scrape up the most you can here comes the freedom man asking you to buy a share of freedom today a many stamps today give kitties would be blessed we all invest in the ESS [Music] [Music] [Music] the country is now deeply suspicious of anyone unamerican at first the suspicion extends to all enemy aliens Italian German and Japanese suspects are interrogated some arrested but very soon the suspicion centers on the Japanese when the war started I was at fishing business in terminal islands with the rest of the 3500 Japanese fishs now on February 1942 we were uh ordered to stay home not to go out of fishing and uh we put away all the Nets tied the boats and all you have to do is stay home and uh and uh watch what's going on up and down the West Coast the slogan of the day is watch those [Music] Japs I was married and had two children and was expecting a third and we had started a nursery and had been working on it day and night for about a year and we were just starting to sell and then everything went up in the air to many Americans there is now little distinction between the Japanese enemy and Japanese here at home rumors spread that American defeats in the Pacific were due to spying by Japanese in America from the White House today came the most drastic action yet taken against possible fifth column activity sabotage and spying on the Pacific coast in February the government begins evacuating all West Coast Japanese more than 110,000 people 2/3 of them citizens are forced to leave their homes and businesses we were all sitting on the bus and I was thinking to everybody's so brave nobody's crying and I wasn't going to cry either and then this lady came up to me and she looked in the bus window and she said uh oh you have a tiny baby how old is the baby and I said 3 weeks and then and I cried all the way and I felt like a fool because cuz nobody else cried they didn't even cry when I cried they were that they could hold it in that much I lost everything I had a three sets of a net one is the tuna Nets next one is the macroon Nets and another one is for sardines the three different sets which cost me almost about $55,000 it's already paid I work so hard I work so hard I just paid everything up I try to find every way what become of ERS of probies nobody seems to know by August the interment is complete for nearly 3 years the Japanese will be imprisoned in remote and desolate parts of the country not one charge of sabotage is ever [Music] substantiated today we say with pride and humility that we are Americans knowing in our hearts that americanism in its deepest meaning stands for the freedom and the welfare and the Brotherhood of the plain people of the world wherever they may [Applause] be deep down in my heart I I didn't have this this this loyalty this patriotism because uh let's face it I had never really experiened uh some of the things in life that I would have loved to experience and that maybe was worth fighting for while America is fighting for democracy abroad racial tensions here at home are on the rise The Poisoned relations between blacks and whites in America begin to erupt in violent incidents there were riots in various communities um around the country there was a feeling on the part of people um living under almost intolerable conditions that uh there is no real hope for significant change at army bases especially in the South black and white soldiers are involved in racial clashes some are killed in Harlem a riot is touched off by a rumor that police have shot a black GI but the worst race RI of the war occurs in Detroit the mixture of white migrants from the south and Northern blacks is a pow keg about to explode [Music] [Applause] Governor Kelly of Michigan has ordered martial law in Detroit where race riots have killed 11 men and injured more than 500 since last midnight martial law will take effect at 10: p.m. Eastern war time when the rioting is over 25 blacks and nine whites have died