I have made a change in plans "Again". I know that I said that we were going to continue the 1930s but we have reasons that we are going to another study.
I thought I could do another year of the 1930s but right now with our country in so much turmoil and starting to resemble the 1930s we need something to pull us together. I have felt quite empty and stagnated with finding the best parts of the 1930s.
Another reason is that Charles is wanting to further study the 1940s and we only get a few years here and there that we can sync our year. We were going to sync 1931, but the research of the 1930s show us the wealthy people are getting more wealthy while the simple working folks losing their homes. The wealthy are just buying up the businesses and homes and are taking more control and getting more wealthy. I feel sad much of the time.
The 1930s had some good times due to kind humans and learning the strength they had to get through these difficult challenges.
Charles and I will still study and reference the 1930s because if we were adults during this time we would have lived through all of the great depression and well before that time and we still want to understand what our family went through during this time.
My childhood furniture.
We have one more chance to sync and that is to 1941 if we do it right now. As I am typing this we are two days away from the bombing of pearl harbor December the 7th 1941. If we jump into that year to study now we can sync with the newspapers to the date and day.
Charles has always been drawn to the 1940s, when he was a boy he played with his army men and made battlefields, his Great Grandmother gave him a book called Operation Sea Lion. His great aunt gave him Stars and Stripes and Anchors away. Charles served in the Navy when he became an adult.
Inside the homes did not change very often but magazines did and those that could afford to follow trends. There was much more tempting than buying.
Now that he has just recently retired he wants to read the old newspapers day by day and do a deeper research into ww2. In the other 1940s studies Charles did not have the time to read everything he wanted and now he can read all the pages in the newspapers day by day as he is going to start reading tomorrow morning. He will read me the details about the home front as he comes across the articles. I am especially interested in the Red Cross information.
At our age we want to do the things we enjoy and researching and learning about the past is what we want to do. It also keeps our brains healthy. We are both slowing down a lot the past couple of years and have health issues so we want to do the things we can do while we can do. I hope that you all understand us changing the study.
We are starting tomorrow to start pre studying December 1941 here in the month of December and will continue on with the new study of 1942 January 1st. We will be synced by the date and day so the newspapers will read on the same day. We will be 84 years apart from then and now.
I have many things that I want to do and many unfinished projects that I started during the 1940s studies. I will make sure to finish knitting those authentic bandages that women knitted during ww2 for the red cross, and the knitted bath cloths are very nice.
I would have had these cups and saucers during the 1940s because I would have had them in the 1930s. It really is all merged into a twenty year period.
Many of you that read my blog are from many different parts of the world, your countries were already engaged in the war since September 1939.
In the UK rationing started January 1940 with sugar, butter, and bacon. In the United States, January of 1942 started with tires, then sugar, coffee and then progressed during 1943.
Before Pearl Harbor was bombed the United States involvement was not fighting but we were supplying economic aid and military supplies to allies. That all changed with the attack on Pearl Harbor.
My Father was stationed at Pearl Harbor during WW2 but was not on a ship during the bombing. In the United States, by the end of ww2 about ten million men were inducted into the selective service.
My studies during 1940 as all of the studies is about the Home Front. What happened to the families remaining at home?
It was a time when some people had electricity and running water and some did not. Some people had cars and trucks and some people still had horse and wagons.
This is why it was necessary to study the 1930s and still is to reference so that we understand what the people went through during this time.
As bad as the war was, it actually helped some people due to military pay even though military pay was very little but it was some money coming in. Also many women went to work during ww2 to take place of the men that went off to war and that was income coming in.
Food changed during ww2 due to rationing and so people had to become even more creative than they were during the great depression. Now they had a bit more money, but they could not buy food and items due to rationing.
World war 2, was when people pulled together and what is the best part of horrible time. Women and men left at home were involved in many ways helping to fight this war all over the world.
We found out during the 2017 studies of the 1940s that one of my diaries recorded the older husband having to go several days of the week to the the top of a building to do war duty watching for war planes.
Women were patching clothing just like during the great depression but this time due to shortages of fabric due to rationing. There is always still more to learn.
Some of the things going on here at home.
Charles and I are moving some things around in our home as we are doing some needed home repairs, we are not fast anymore so everything gets done very slowly but that is okay. We will continue to have the look of the 1930s and 1940s because this is what makes sense to us and makes us happy.
We still have our fall garden growing and we are thinking about our spring Victory Garden and what we need to do about that.
I will share with you some knitting and crochet patterns from during the 1940s, as well as other things I never had time to share as we continue with our studies.
I would love to get back to doing some bobbin lace, this lace goes far back in history but continued on throughout today, however it is a rare thing to do.
We can share information in the forum with each other as we learn together from combined research from the 1930s and 1940s. It all helps in understanding difficult times in history to help us in our present time.
We will be merging our knowledge of both decades.
Do you have any projects that you like to do that were skills from long ago?
We saw a beautiful quilt in the forum a few posts back, Quilting is another important skill learned long ago and still done today.
I would be pleased to see you in the forum. Happy December! :)
Grandma Donna
