Q: Where did you live during the war?

A: I lived with my parents.

 

Q: Why did you to live with them?

A: Well, because I didn’t want to live alone, and so I moved back with them - - to be with them.

 

Q: Because Grandpa (her husband, Paul McDonald) went to war?

A: Because Grandpa went to war.

 

Q: What were you doing when you heard the news that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor?

A: Getting ready to take Jean(her first daughter) home. We had been with my parents and we were going to go back home. That is where we were going. Grandpa heard it on the radio. (that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor).

 

Q: How old were you?

A: Oh, I was about 26.

 

Q: What were you thoughts?

A: Why he’d have to go. They had registered and he was l W; his number was low.

 

Q: What did that mean?

A: That they took him by the numbers as they went. They start with the low numbers and you know, go on through the numbers.

 

Q: It depends on the their age?

A: No, It was just when they registered. When they registered they got a number and the next guy got the next number. It didn’t make any difference what their age was. He was low- he had a number that was low in that county.

 

Q: Were you scared of what was happening?

A: We knew it was coming. We knew it before we were married even, that it was coming evidently. Because as long as the war wasn’t broke out why we didn’t worry to much.

 

Q: What were you doing when you heard the news that the atomic bomb had been dropped on Japan and the war was over?

A: I don’t remember at all what I was doing.

 

Q: How did you feel?

A: Well, I felt good. I knew that he would evidently come home. It was a long time afterwards before he got home. Because they had points that they - -.  I don’t know how it went anymore and I know it was quite a while.

 

Q: He had to accumulate points?

A: I don’t know just how they did that really, I can’t really tell you but the war was over in May wasn’t it? He didn’t get home until November. It was a long time - - November.

 

Q: What one word most often comes to mind when you think of those years? Why?

A: Well, it was hard. Course, I was with him part of the time ,and the housing was terrible.

 

Q: How was the housing?

A: The housing was terrible.

 

Q: How did they do that?

A: They just didn’t have no housing and what they had were real picky (about) who could live there. Jean was small.  She was two years and we were out in California and we couldn’t find a place to live.

 

Q: You and your mom and your dad?

A: No, just me and a friend of mine. She was a friend from Indiana that was with me. We were out there, and we could not find housing.

 

Q: Was this after?

A: No this was when he was still in.

 

Q: You just decided to move out of your parents' house?

A: Well, no. I was with your grandpa and he was out there on maneuvers, and we could go with them. We were out there and we couldn’t find a place to live. So we drove for miles and miles and in some places that had a place, they didn’t want a child. Finally we left.  I left and  went down to Cedar Rapids up in San Magill. [Then] I went down to Los Angeles, down to his uncle’s and I stayed there for about a month. Then your Grandpa came and got me and he went on up . I stayed with two other girls in a small apartment in a house until they (the husbands) got shipped out. Then we came on home, so we did.

I couldn’t drive a car, I had a car and could not drive it. These two girls drove the car for me one from Denver and one from Iowa. We came home just us three girls and we made it. Then pretty soon grandma and grandpa [her mom and dad] came down and got me in Travis [Missouri]. But it was just no place to find and housing was terrible.

 

Q: How did food and gas rationing work?

A: Well you had so many coupons for your gas. They gave you a book that lasted a certain amount of time. When we turned and came home from out there we went to a place out there and we got extra coupons. They allowed us extra to come home on. The food-- there was meat I know [and] I think sugar. I don’t remember. When I was out there with him, he got rations to eat to come home. It’s been a long time ago.

 

Q: What were victory gardens, and did you have one?

A: No, I didn’t. We never had them.

 

Q: Did your family participate in meatless/ wheatless days?

A: Well, meatless days, yeah.

 

Q: When were those meatless days?

A: Well, Fridays, of course, but if you ran out of your food stamps, well then you could only but so much meat with stamps.

 

Q: Did your family buy bonds?

A: Yes, I bought bonds.

 

Q: How did these work?

A: Well, you paid so much. You paid $18 for a $25 bond, and it would mature after a certain amount a years. After about 5 years it matured to $25.

 

Q: Did you buy a lot of them?

A: No, I just bought two and Grandpa bought some too, while he was at war.

 

Q: In what ways did ordinary people support the war effort?

A: Well, they worked in war factories. I don’t know what they were.

 

Q: How did you learn what was happening in the war overseas?

A: Well, [we] listened to the radio and your grandpa used to write [me].

 

Q: Did he keep you updated?

A: He didn’t write much because he wasn’t allowed. Everything was screened. All his letters were read and censored. I received all his letters. But he never wrote anything he wasn’t supposed to write. Most of the time I didn’t know where he was at.

 

Q: Did you do anything special to keep track of the news, like keep a scrapbook?

A: Yes.

 

Q: How did the war affect your family life?

A: My mom and dad took care of Jean while I worked some [housecleaning]. It was hard but we went on. I lived with my parents. I know we got along.

 

Q: Did any members of your immediate family go overseas?

A: Grandpa and a cousin of mine. I had a cousin killed over in Italy. He got killed before grandpa went over. My mother and a neighbor lady was talking about my cousin getting killed, [another] next door neighbor lady hear it. She didn’t hear it all and,  course she knew that I had come home and Paul had gone across. She interpreted that it was him [Paul] and not my cousin. She repeated it several times. She started a rumor. My brother heard the rumor and asked me how I felt and I said I felt fine. Because I didn’t hear it.

 

Q: Were you or your family able to maintain contact with them?

A: Through letters I would receive letters almost everyday. Sometimes he wouldn’t receive ours for weeks because he kept           moving around. One time he wrote us and said nobody has been writing him, then pretty soon he’d have a big stack of letters.

 

Q: How strong are your memories of this period compared to other times in your life? How do you explain that?

A: Very strong, mostly because of the housing. We sometimes had to sleep in the car, because we had no place to sleep.

 

Q: How did living through this war period change your life?

A: I don’t think it changed our lives. We just pick up where we left off. He was a truck driver before the war, he just went back to truck driving.

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