Terkel #6

Peter Ota, Nisei lives in Los Angeles and his father is a leader of the Japanese chamber of commerce. Unfortunately, while they were living fine in the United States they were forced to evacuate their area and were shipped to Santa Anita where their future was uncertain. They were forced to lie in these small barracks that were not very nice and did not allow for privacy. This had really change the thoughts of Peter and his family, especially his father as Peter explained his father, "Had put all his faith in this country."(207) After they were sent to these internment camps Peter's father had lost some of his faith that he previously had for America. These camps can relate to what was going on during the Holocaust because when Hitler was in power he was forcing the Jews out of their areas and made them go into these concentration camps. These camps are similar because both minorities were forced to leave their homes and go to these horrible camps with bad conditions.Though Peter and his family were stuck on these camps, there was one way to leave them. Peter decided to take this route in which he would work on sugar beet farms.  Though the pay was very low and the conditions were not great, Peter felt it was a better alternative than staying in the camps. When he was old enough, Peter was drafted into the army. This was a little ironic because when he was fighting in the war, his family was at the camp waiting for the war to end. Peter suffered a tragedy when he was entering the army as his mother passed away. After his service was finished Peter wanted to be able to blend into the community and become a part of "white America". Later in life when Peter was married and had a daughter, his daughter questioned him about these internment camps and it was very difficult for him and others to talk about the terrible experiences they had with them. This can relate to my grandfather because even though he served in the Army he did not really want to talk about it ever because of some of the bad memories that were involved with it.

Betty Basye Hutchinson was a nurse that helped many young men in the war. At first it was hard for her because they made the nurses pay for rent for the places that they were staying in when serving as nurses even though Betty did not have any money to pay for it. Luckily for her the government helped these nurses and paid for their homes. She became a very popular nurse as many people would take pictures of her and she was even given a nickname as the "twirl girl". Many of the nurses dropped out of this job in order to join the army. She got the accomadation of being an official nurse when she said, "The day President Roosevelt died I was an official Army nurse"(213). Though Betty really liked working as a nurse it was very hard as she had to go through seeing some very disgusting images. She was working in the orthapedic field were some of the soldiers were severly wounded and had many body parts that were distorted. One of the soldiers that she worked on was Bill and he claimed he would not leave the room until his face was put back to normal. Betty knew that it was not going to be possible to fix these battle wounds, but she did her best work to replace his face. After the war Betty was with Bill and it was very hard to go out in public as the wounds of Bill's face were still very visible. Others would give them bad looks and feel disgusted when around them, but they knew that they would have to go through some of this disrespect from others by the looks they got from others. This can relate to my life because my grandmother suffered a fire which has left burned parts all over her body. When I am with her some people may look at her differently, but by now our family has become suceptible to this and know that others may look at her in this way. Anyways Betty was still disappointed because she didn't understand why these soldiers were fighthing because there was always going to be some conlfict before, during, and after the war is fought. This can relate to the past and present because though many wars were fought, many problems have still not been solved. We still have many soldiers all over the world today because there seems like there will always be conflicts with other countries.    

Studs Terkel #5

Peggy Terry worked in a factory with her sister and mother loading shells, ammunition, and other materials to help in the production for necessities for World War II. Unlike others Peggy actually enjoyed going to work because it gave her something to do and she knew that the money she could collect could help towards create a better life for herself and her family. Though she was not very knowledgeable about what she was making at work she just found joy in going to work. She was not very connected to what was going on with the world as she was not very aware of the war that was going on, and this could be due to the fact that she didn't have a radio like many others who received their news from. She stated that the radios were mostly a part of the rich people's lives as she said, "having a radio was a luxury." This can relate back to the Great Depression that we learned about earlier in the year because it shows that a majority of the citizens in the country were still recovering from this economic downfall and that a radio was not a necessity for the middle class citizens at the time. Though she had a job along with her mother they did not allow for any flexibility in the job. Peggy's grandmother was very sick and on the verge of death and Peggy's mother wanted to take a leave of absence to help her out, but instead the company fired her because they did not give anybody any time off. In Peggy's time working in the factory she had built up a hate for the Japanese even though she did not have any personal interactions with them. All she knew was that the American soldiers were fighting against them and that was enough for her to create a hate for them. Along with not knowing much about the war, Peggy did not realize the meanings of human rights and had no idea of the cruelty going on in the concentration camps. This puts Peggy in a bad position because if she is ever in trouble she would not know how to fight for her rights and would be at a disadvantage. Many people in the workforce most likely built up a similar dislike to the Japanese citizens as they knew that their American soldiers were fighting their lives against them.

E.B. Sledge was in a different situation that Peggy as he was a soldier on the Pacific area of the battlefield. Sledge was only 19 years old when he had to enter the war. This can relate to the recent Terkel reading about Bob Rasmus because he was only 14 years old when he entered the war as a soldier. Both of these kids were very young and brave men to have the courage to serve for the country at such a young age. It just amazes me that so many of these soldiers that had to serve in the war were teenagers my age that were fighting for their lives everyday trying to help out the country. Being at such a young age these soldiers needed to gain friendships with each other in order to have trust. These close relationships among the soldiers helped the boys deal with their low points and carry on with their efforts. As sledge describes one of his stories he talks about a Japanese soldier. The soldier was already captured and instead of accepting defeat he tried to kill himself along with another American soldier in a suicide bombing attack. This was just the way that the Japanese soldiers were trained and they had to do anything to help out their country in the war. Sledge learned from this that he had to be able to have courage and be aware of the things going on around him. He had to cope with the terrible images of the dead bodies around him and carry on with his attacks. Just from watching the clip today in class from Saving Private Ryan shows me that this must have been extremely difficult to deal with the images surrounding them as bodies were blowing up all over the place. Close companions were dying left and right and they had to move on from these hardships and keep on fighting. It was hard to even see the images on the film so I could imagine how hard it must be to fight in the war and be seeing people getting killed all over the place.

An Oral History of World War II

After reading the introduction of the oral history of WWII I realized that this war really changed the United States as a whole. This gave me a great background on information leading into the story of Bob Rasmus the rifleman. In this introduction they described how this war changed the psyche and the face of the world as it gave them a different outlook to the rest of the world. In this war there were many negative aspects of it as many citizens struggled to survive everyday. In the introduction it said, "First thing you talked about is what you wanted in your stomach."(165) This shows that many of the citizens at the time were uncertain of their meals everyday which can directly relate to the Great Depression that we learned about early in the Stud Terkel readings as many families were poor and did not know the food that they would eat for the day. Though there were many negatives from this war it created many openings for others as it gave women and minorities a better chance at getting a good job in a good enviroment. As many of the many were serving in the army it opened up plenty oppurtunities for others and these companies were finally willing to hire these people in order to keep their company in business. The New Deal that was passed created many jobs for all citizens and gave many people a good chance at becomming succesful. This relates to World War I because when this war was declared it caused total war to occur and in both situations minorites took over many of the jobs that the men occupied before the war. Though this opened up many oppurtunites for the women the war create some horrible images for the men serving in it. As they would walk past stacks and piles of their dead enemies it created a unforgettable image in these soldiers minds as they look at their enemies in the eyes. Overall this war was good for the country because it opened up chances for others and help bring the country together as they all had a common goal to win the war. In the story of Bob Rasmus he faced a hard situation as he had to serve in the army when he was only 14 years old. I can relate to this because I cannot imagine having to serve in the army when I was only 14 years old. To be honest I cannot even imagine serving in the army at 17 years old, so Bob needed to have a lot of courage to risk his life to serve for his country. He wanted to prove to others his manhood by entering this war, but he did not realize the images that he would be faced with. He had only thought about the positive parts of war and did not yet really think about having to actually kill others. As he grows throughout the story we realize that Bob's mindset changes and he has the integrity to kill his enemies. He turned into a completely new person by the end of the war from the beginning as he realized that he needed to change his mindset in order to survive this war. Not only did the mindset of Bob change from before the war to after, but the mindset of the entire country because America knew that it needed to do anything possible in order to win this war.