The true account of World War II as seen through eyes of thirty-four mid-Western Americans. Covering the war on a year by year basis, it is the story of how the war affected these individuals and their families, many times in their own words. Covered is not only the military who went off to war, but also the wives, the sweethearts, and the children of the military, as well as those who stayed behind to hold down the home front – the factory worker, the German POW guard, the farmer. It is the story of how they willingly struggled with rationing, how they willingly assisted each other when the need arose, how they willingly collected recyclables and other goods for the war effort, without any expectation of compensation. It is also the story of the military members, why and when they entered the service as well as how they served their country in the time of need – the B-17 ball turret gunner, the Higgins boat pilot, the Marine landing on Okinawa and Guam, the Japanese held POW, the WAC and the WAAC. In summary, it is the story of their war! A war that “nobody, nobody shirked their duty.”

WORLD WAR II IN MID-AMERICA

EXPERIENCES FROM RURAL MID-AMERICA DURING THE SECOND WORLD WARBy Robert C. Daniels

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2012 Robert C. Daniels
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4772-3684-0

Contents

Preface..........................................viiAcknowledgments..................................xiPrologue.........................................xvDifficult Yet Peaceful Times.....................1The Day of Infamy................................311942.............................................511943.............................................931944.............................................1311945.............................................171Picking up the Pieces............................209Epilogue.........................................237Selected Bibliography............................241Endnotes.........................................247Index............................................267

Chapter One

Difficult Yet Peaceful Times

Nazi Germany's 1 September 1939 invasion of Poland signaled the beginning of war in Europe, a war that would eventually engulf all of Europe, North Africa, and a good portion of the Middle-East. Although this act plunged Europe into war, the United States, under the tutelage of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, maintained its strict policy of isolationism and neutrality. This same timeframe saw the Western Pacific, specifically China, also in turmoil. Even before the 1 July 1937 'China Incident,' in which Japanese soldiers of the Kwantung Army opened fire on Chinese National troops, the Japanese had been encroaching into the Asian mainland, not hesitating to use military force when the need arose. On 12 December of the same year as the China Incident, the USS Panay, an American naval gunboat flying an oversized American flag, was bombed by Japanese Imperial Navy bombers on China's Yangtze River, killing an Italian journalist and two American sailors. Within a year, most of the fertile portions of China had fallen to Japan. As a result, although maintaining its isolationism and neutrality in the European war and overlooking the Panay incident, by the end of the 1930's, with Japan's push for their Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in nearly full swing, diplomatic relations between the United States and Japan were increasingly deteriorating to the extent that if things did not change, and soon, war in the Pacific might very well be imminent.

Throughout the 1930's, cities and villages in the United States had been reeling from the 29 October 1929 stock market crash, commonly referred to as Black Tuesday, which touched off the Great Depression, nearly devastating the country. Not only the United States was affected by this crash, but nearly the entire world had been suffering as well. People, hard working people, were out of work, some having been so for years. It was estimated that in the United States alone, nearly one in four adults of working age—twenty-five percent of the working population—were out of work at the height of the Depression. The respective governments tried to help, but with limited success. Only Germany, under their Nazi Dictator, Adolf Hitler, of all of the free-market societies, seemed to be showing any type of real signs of progress.

The mid-western American town of Waupun, Wisconsin, was no exception. By 1938, Waupun, situated in the southern-mid-eastern portion of the state along the headwaters of the Rock River, was a relatively small farming community typical of many other small, mid-western American farming communities. The three real main differences offsetting it from the other communities of its size was the fact that the State's maximum security prison, the State's Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, and the National Rivet and Manufacturing Company were all three situated within the town's small city limits. Even with these three institutions, however, the Waupun area was still suffering from the Depression. Jobs were hard to find and money was scarce to purchase even the needed goods, much less any luxuries. Children of the era were growing up poor, yet many never realized it at the time since it was all they had really known, it was all they had been used to.

Due to the Depression and lack of work, Joseph "Joe" and Linda (Paskey) Bohnert and their four children were forced to move from time to time throughout the decade following the stock market crash. But somehow, with the exception of a short move to South Dakota, they always managed to remain within a ten mile radius of Waupun. Linda had been born in the town in 1896 to German immigrants. Joe, twelve years older than Linda, had, himself, emigrated from Switzerland in 1914. With Joe being forced to regularly seek new employment upon the termination of numerous short-lived jobs, and since new jobs became more and more scarce as the decade progressed, the family was forced to move even more oft en than before due to the lack of availability of work within walking distance—cars were a luxury the family could ill afford.

Prior to the market crash, Joe had worked for the Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, commonly known simply as the Central State Hospital or Central State, located on the outskirts of Waupun. He had also worked for his father-in-law at the family owned tavern in town. But during the Depression jobs just became too scarce. He was eventually able to get assistance from the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The WPA was established in 1935 by presidential order and funded by Congress through 1943, when it was disbanded due to the World War II war boom. The organization provided jobs and income for many of the unemployed during the Great Depression, and built roads and parks, as well as art, literary, and drama projects. Like many areas around the country, local projects were constructed by the WPA in the Waupun area as well. Two of these are still visible at the Fond du Lac County Park, just outside of the town. Both the park's band shell and the lining on the Rock River, where it flows through the park, were constructed by WPA workers.

The organization required that individuals work for assistance, and, as one of Joe's daughters was to remember, "Many of the people refused to work, but dad did, and got on with the [Waupun] City Parks Department." This job required Joe to get up before the sun every school-day morning and roll the tennis courts at the high school with a heavy roller to maintain the courts' flat, smooth playing surfaces. He was also a caretaker of the city's flower gardens.

To help the family, his wife Linda also worked for awhile at the local five and dime store. When Joe and Linda's children were old enough, they too pitched in to help. They would babysit and do other odd jobs; nearly anything for a little money. "I would babysit for Uncle Walter and Aunt Louise [Paskey]," reported Joe and Linda's oldest daughter, Doris, "and on the way home, I would stop off at the butcher's and buy 15 cents worth of cold cuts. That would be enough for each of us to have one or two slices of meat with our potatoes for supper." Like many of her generation, Doris was born not in a hospital, but at home in the family dwelling—in Waupun on 22 July 1923.

Even with Joe working through the WPA and his other odd jobs, Linda working at the Five and Dime, and their children helping when they could, times were financially rough on the family. Money was scarce, and hand-me-down clothes were the sign of the times in the Bohnert household. Linda would use her treadle-powered Singer sewing...