Description
Book SynopsisRosie the Riveter is an icon for women''s industrial contribution to World War II, but history has largely overlooked the three million women who served on America''s agricultural front. The Women''s Land Army sent volunteers to farms, canneries, and dairies across the country, accounting for the majority of wartime agricultural labor. On the Farm Front tells for the first time the remarkable story of these women who worked to ensure both Freedom from Want at home and victory abroad.
Formed in 1943 as part of the Emergency Farm Labor Program, the WLA placed its workers in areas where American farmers urgently needed assistance. Many farmers in even the most desperate areas, however, initially opposed women working their land. Rural administrators in the Midwest and the South yielded to necessity and employed several hundred thousand women as farm laborers by the end of the war, but those in the Great Plains and eastern Rocky Mountains remained hesitant, suffering seriou
Trade Review
Carpenter has exhaustively researched the WLA and its various activities, and her book should serve as the starting point for anyone interested in gender issues on the wartime farm front.
* American Historical Review *
Carpenter succeeds admirably.
* Indiana Magazine of History *
Her writing style is clear, her organization is superb, and her interpretations are sound.
* The Annals of Iowa *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction—"We Can Drive Tractors"
Part I—Creating the Women's Land Army
1. Prewar Precedents
2. The Federal Government and the WLA
3. "Now We're Set"—Outfitting the WLA
4. "Pitch in and Help"—Calling Women to the Farms
Part II—The Women's Land Army in Action
5. The East—Dorothy Thompson Led the Way
6. The West—"Ho! For a Tall Glass of Lemonade!"
7. The Midwest—In the House or in the Fields
8. The South—When Race and Class Get in the Way
9. The WLA and Postwar Women
Appendix
Notes
Bibliography
Index
