“Rosie the Riveter” by Christine Petersen
Cornerstones of Freedom, 2nd Series, Children’s Press, New York, 2005, 48 pages, Grades 4-6.
The Second World War created massive changes throughout American society. Millions of men were drafted into the military to wage a brutal war against determined enemies.
This huge army and navy is dependent on the supplies and manufacturing products constructed on the home front. A serious problem immediately develops: how can you make things if all the workers are gone? Where do you find the enormous amount of manpower needed to fulfill these tasks? The answer is found in womanpower. As the factories creating the war supplies expand, American women enter the war production industry in massive numbers. The famous American artist, Norman Rockwell, immortalizes these women in his famous paintings of a strong sheet metal worker named Rosie the Riveter.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor Dec. 7, 1941, the United States enters World War II. A draft is instituted and millions of men join the armed forces. With most of the men in military service, President Franklin D. Roosevelt urges industry to hire women to build war materials. Known as Women Ordnance Workers (WOMs), these women soon learn skills ranging from riveting bolts through airplane wings to welding aircraft carriers. The WOMs soon produce vast amounts of war materials necessary to fight in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Aleutian Islands in Alaska.
It becomes quickly apparent that women are not too weak to carry out these formidable tasks as some had feared. More and more women join the war industries as the conflict progresses. By 1943, the colossal production of military supplies made by these women gives the American and British military the resources to defeat the armies of Nazi Germany and the Japanese Empire.
Norman Rockwell’s iconic picture in the Saturday Evening Post celebrates Rosie the Riveter, representing all the WOMS. She sits eating a sandwich while holding a giant riveting gun. Next to her muscular arms is her lunch bucket with her name, Rosie, inscribed on the top. It is simply a great picture.
The WOMS continue their tremendous work until the end of the war. The country owes them a great debt for their hard work and sacrifice.
Phyllis Gould, who died July 20 at the age of 99, was one of the original Rosie the Riveters. Working for 90 cents an hour, she welded ships in a California shipyard. Though many of the WOMs did not make as much money as the men working in these jobs, Phyllis made the going rate for welders. She was determined to create a museum in honor of the five million civilian women working in the war industries. The museum is now built and March 21st has been declared National Rosie the Riveter Day.
Rosie the Riveter is personally important to me because my mother, Roberta Nollen, welded aircraft carriers in the Portland Ship Yards for three years and my mother-in-law Mary Jane Dailey ground down the rivets on airplane wings during the war. I am inordinately proud to have come from such dauntless women. I hope you get a chance to read this fine book. I found it informative and touching.
