In an interview with Mother Jones about his new documentary The War (which begins airing tonight on PBS), Ken Burns says that the loss of WWII memories was one of his motivations for creating the film.
"...we are losing 1,000 veterans a day." Burns says. "I'm in the memory business, and this is a hemorrhage of memory that is just too difficult for me to countenance. Someone once said that the death of a man was like the loss of a library. It's a collection of all of these histories that go away as each person dies."
Elizabeth Richardson's memory of WWII would have been one of the many personal accounts that might have been lost had it not been for a historian's curiosity and a pack rat brother.
James H. Madison is the historian who brings Elizabeth Richardson's story of WWII to life in his new book, Slinging Doughnuts for the Boys. The IU Press blog interviewed Madison about the fascinating subject of his book.
IU Press blog: How did you discover the story of Elizabeth Richardson?
James Madison: I was visiting the American Cemetery at Normandy, walking among the 9,387 markers, reading the names and taking photographs. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry was there. And then I saw “Elizabeth.”
Why was a women buried at Normandy? What did she do to deserve a place in this sacred soil? What did she do to help defeat the Nazis? That was the beginning.
IUPB: In the introduction of your book, you write: “nothing has changed my connection to this war more profoundly than...Elizabeth Richardson.” How did her story impact you?
JM: Liz Richardson’s story affects me on several levels. On the personal level, my father was a combat infantryman in Europe (the book is dedicated to him and to my mother, a home front nurse). He never talked much abut it, but I’ve imagined that a Red Cross girl like Liz gave him a cup of coffee, a doughnut, and a cheery “hello soldier, where you from?”
I’ve always been interested in World War II (and teach a course on the war at Indiana University). So, I’ve read lots and lots about the war, and particularly how it affected the lives of ordinary people around the world, not only Americans, but Japanese, British, French, etc.
Reading Liz’s letters and diary and then working in other primary sources to bring her story to life allowed me to connect with one individual more directly than ever before and to see how that one person’s life related to all sorts of themes, issues, and contexts of the war years. I very much came to admire this woman and to respect her contributions to the war effort.
IUPB: Richardson joined the Red Cross as a Clubmobile volunteer during WWII. Explain what the Clubmobile volunteers did and the importance of their work.
JM: The Clubmobile work makes sense only if you understand who the “boys” were. We call them men, but many were boys, and I deliberately use that term in my title, as did many people at the time. They were very young. Many were not high school graduates. Many had seldom traveled outside their home county before going into military service. Overseas, in a foreign culture (even England was very different from home), they were often troubled, anxious, and very, very homesick. The military designated the American Red Cross to respond to this morale issue.
The Red Cross set up all sorts of programs, including the Clubs in big cities. The Rainbow Club in London was the most famous. But most soldiers and airmen were far from the cities. The answer: put the Red Cross Club on wheels, actually on converted London buses. Fitted out with a coffee machine and a doughnut machine these Clubmobiles traveled around the English countryside (and later the French and German) bringing coffee and doughnuts to the GIs. Coffee and doughnuts were only the props. The real stars of the Clubmobile were the women inside. Wearing lipstick and a cheery smile, they greeted the GIs with the language of America. They looked like the girls back home. They knew how to banter and joke, how to do the jitterbug dances of the day, how to talk about the Brooklyn Dodgers and Glenn Miller. For many lonely, homesick boys overseas these women were the closest touch of home they knew.
The Clubmobile women were always called “girls.” But they were sophisticated and mature. All were in their late 20s, all were college graduates. They were carefully selected and trained before going overseas. Liz’s personal qualities of intelligence, curiosity, and character shine through in her diary and letters, as does her wonderfully engaging writing style.
These Red Cross women came to know the GIs and to know war, to know not only the necessity of this war but also its costs--the emotional as well as physical costs.
IUPB: As a historian, do you think that enough attention is given to the contributions those women like Elizabeth Richardson made to the war effort?
JM: We’ve known for a long time that war, certainly World War II, is not about men only. We’ve known that women, children, and civilians generally played large roles in this war in all nations. Nonetheless, their stories tend to get lost in the “man talk” of war. Perhaps it’s natural to assume that a man in uniform played a larger role than a woman. Liz Richardson is one among many women whose role in this war deserves our understanding and, I believe, our respect.
IUPB: Richardson’s story might have gone untold if her brother had not have kept her letters and diaries. What kinds of things are historians doing to preserve the personal accounts of those who experienced WWII?
JM: For the historian it’s no sources, no story.
Charley Richardson is a pack rat, and I’m so glad of that. He gathered up his sister’s diary and her letters to family and friends, and he saved them all these years. He saved too the wonderful watercolors she painted overseas.
Charley is one of many Americans who have preserved the records of the war. But we need to do more, including making sure that these primary sources are there for generations to come. They really belong in libraries and archives, where they will be professionally cared for and where the risks of loss and deterioration will be greatly diminished.
There are many projects to gather oral histories. I benefited from several of these, including one at the American Red Cross. Many universities, public libraries, and historical societies are also doing interviews, including the Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress.
