■ Opinion: Local woman has vivid memories of attack.
As an 88 year old, I have vivid memories of Dec. 7, 1941, the day Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese. I was 9 years old living in Hollywood, which was only seven miles from the ocean. My dad and mom had taken us five children for a Sunday drive to Santa Monica beach and up the coastline.
Suddenly, an alert message on the car radio announced the bombing raid. Instructions: If you are driving, return home immediately. DO NOT turn on your headlights. All those at home: DO NOT turn on your household lights.
Further instructions were to cover all windows with blackout material at night, which continued on for months. Curfews on nighttime driving were strictly enforced. Air raid wardens were organized. They were issued “hard hats” to patrol assigned neighborhoods at night to ensure all blackouts were followed. We experienced frequent Air Raid drills day and night.
While at school, during the drills we hid under our desk until the “all clear” was heard. Our classroom windows were fitted with black window shades.
Communities held “scrap drives,” collecting any kind of metal, paper, newspaper and rubber tires. Volunteers went house to house collecting our pots and pans to be melted down for use in building battleships, aircraft, military vehicles and weaponry. Auto dealerships no longer had new cars for sale.
All metal and most commodities went toward the war effort.
My dad contributed to the war effort by building battleships at the San Pedro shipyards. My mother worked at Lockheed Aircraft plant — one of the hundreds of “Rosie the Riveters.” That’s when women started wearing pants (trousers), necessary for climbing through airplane fuselages.
Long hair was secured in crocheted wool slings tied at the top of one’s head, called Snudes. These became fashionable, as seen in movies. I sported a red one, often worn to school.Hemlines became shorter because fabric was needed for military uniforms, tents, etc.
Silk stockings were no longer available. All silk went to making parachutes. As a substitute, women painted their legs with leg makeup, drawing “seams” down the back with eyebrow pencil. The war changed women’s fashions forever.
Soon families were issued rationing stamps upon registration by head of household at local schools. Stamps were needed in order to buy their allowance of gasoline, sugar, butter, meat, canned foods and even certain types of clothing.
These were in short supply due to increase in military personnel. That is how margarine (Oleo) found its way to our kitchen tables, which consisted of a one-pound block of white mystery substance, paired with an envelope of orange powder that had to be stirred into it (my job). It looked like butter, but didn’t taste like butter!
Rationing of these commodities was in effect until 1943.
Training classes were held to teach housewives how to shop wisely for groceries with what little was available. Classes were held to educate and encourage growing vegetables in our backyards. We all had victory gardens.
Drafting of our young men into the military went into effect. If you were 18, you were drafted. The young man who later was to become my husband, at 18, while attending Hollywood High School, was sent off to an Army training camp and later deployed.
All Japanese American students disappeared from our classrooms. We wondered why our friends were gone. All Japanese American families were sent to internment camps. There were numerous Japanese farmers who farmed on narrow patches of land along the coastline and beaches from Long Beach all the way up to Santa Barbara.
Beautiful fields of strawberries and row crops could be seen, some sold from roadside stands along Pacific Coast Highway. They quickly disappeared as well, also sent to internment camps.
All Japanese homes, properties and businesses were confiscated by the government, never returned to them after the war. They had to start all over with nothing, putting their lives and families back together again.They did survive.
As I advanced into my teenage years, I was aware USO Clubs were being established for our men in uniform on rest and recuperation, if they were fortunate to be stationed stateside or granted a short furlough. The Hollywood USO opened up three blocks from where we lived, near the famous intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street. Movie stars would volunteer to entertain and dance with our young men. Big bands would also perform, such as Glenn Miller, Harry James, Les Brown and Jimmy Dorsey. Local young ladies would also join in. My 18-yearold sister would walk down the street and dance with the young men.
I was too young to enter, but enjoyed peering in and watching the big stars arrive and later listening to my sister’s stories of the fellows she met from all across our country.
Later in life, I had two lady friends who met their husbands at the USO.
One of the soldiers was aboard a military transport plane, headed to Hawaii when the Pearl Harbor bombing was announced. The plane was turned around, mid-ocean. He ended up in San Francisco. That night he went to the USO and danced with my friend. Soon they were happily married (for 65 years).
It is not widely known that Japanese Navy submarines had made their way undetected into U.S. territory waters and were sitting offshore waiting for attack orders, only a few miles out from the Los Angeles coastline. Catastrophe was so close!
War causes so much grief with the absence and loss of life of so many of our loved ones. War has huge changes and effects on so much more than is realized. It is amazing how we are able to carry on, adapt and adjust to changes and new beginnings brought about by the ravages and actions of war.We did survive.
These were frightening times for those of us who had only experienced war by hearing about it on radio, newspaper and news reels shown in movie theaters. Television had not been invented yet. We never had imagined the conflict of war would ever touch American soil and American lives.On Sept. 2, 1945, President Harry S. Truman announced the war had come to an end. Seventy-plus million lives were lost.