LYNNE SCHALL
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Lynne Schall's Blog

WAC aDs - What's the message?

7/30/2020

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Updated:  2/17/2023

​Are you looking for time capsules back into the 20th century?  

Advertising is a perennial repository of culture brimming with hints of "the way it was."

Some of my favorite ads recruit women to the Women's Army Corps (WAC).   I started collecting WAC advertisements while writing my novel, Women's Company - The Minerva Girls, about WACs in the 1960s and 1970s.

I invite you to take a look at two ads that I added recently to my collection.  Both ads appeared in popular women's magazines. 
  • "Woman of the Army -- USA."  September 1944.  Harper's Bazaar. ​
  • "How to tell your parents you want to join the Army."  September 1972.  Seventeen.  
World War II, WAC Recruiting Ad, September 1944, Harper's Bazaar,
WAC Recruiting Ad, Harper's Bazaar, September 1944

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WHAT CAN WAC ADS TELL YOU ABOUT AMERICAN CULTURE IN WWII?

4/30/2019

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​Advertising is a perennial repository of culture.  
 
Consider the advertisements used by the U.S. Army to recruit women during World War II.  You’ll find a wealth of hints regarding not only the culture of the Army, but also the American public.  As you look at the ads I’ve selected, ask yourself, “Who’s in the ad? Who’s left out? Are they depicted in an accurate or idealized fashion?  Why or why not?” 
WWII - WAAC Recruiting Poster - This is my war, too!
WWII - WAAC Recruiting Poster
​May 14, 1942.  The hard-fought battle to create the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) was over.  President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the legislation the following day, and the race was on.   But how would the pioneers find a way through the maze of a new phenomenon? 
  
Exemplary performance, of course. 
 
And the power of persuasion.   To persuade women to volunteer, to persuade families and friends to accept the wishes of their loved ones, and to persuade the American public to support women in uniform.  

​The WAAC chose patriotism as their major recruiting theme.  

​And that was enough at first. 

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WACs in Hollywood Movies?

5/22/2018

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Nine Movies?  Plus One.  
(updated 5/13/2019; 11/10/2022; 2/17/2023)


Memorial Day is in May in the U.S., and that makes this month a good time to catch up on military movies.  Since my novel, Women’s Company – The Minerva Girls, is about three young women in the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) in the late 1960s and early 1970s, I’ll focus on ten movies that feature women in the WAC.  

​Many of the selected films not only cast well-known actors of the period, but also stars such as Tony Curtis, Cary Grant, William Holden, Janet Leigh, Rosalind Russell, Ann Sheridan, Lana Turner, and Richard Widmark. 

Most of the stories share an underlying theme:  how Army service changes a person.

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Women Soldiers in the U.S. Army:  When did it become legal?

4/30/2018

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Not until July 1, 1943, when President Franklin Roosevelt signed a compromise bill passed by the U.S. Congress to establish the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) giving women full military status. 

​1943.  How come it took so long?
 
After all, hadn’t women
  • practiced home defense on the frontier since Colonial days, provided civilian laundry, cooking, sewing, and nursing services to the U.S. Army since the American Revolution, and enlisted legally with full military rank & status in the Navy & the Marines during World War I?
 
Moreover, didn’t Congress establish
  • the Army Nurse Corps in 1901, and the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) in May 1942? 
 
​And what about
  • the “Hello Girls” of World War I -- 223 telephone operators who were bilingual in English and French and who--at the request of General John J. "Black Jack" Pershing--were sent to France;
  • the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) -- 1,102 civilian women pilots during World War II who thought they, like the women of the WAAC, would eventually be granted full military status in the Army;
  • and the--
WAC Recruiting Ad - 1944 - I'd rather be with them
WAC Recruiting Ad - Life magazine, September 11, 1944

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so who's minerva?

12/29/2017

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Minerva is the ancient Roman equivalent of the Greek goddess Pallas Athene, the goddess of wisdom, warfare, and handicrafts. 

Unlike the god of warfare, Mars, she had nothing to do with bloodlust and brute animal strength.  When Minerva showed up on the battlefield, victory came through courage, sound strategy, and military skill.  After the fighting was over, she led through victory to peace and prosperity. Not surprisingly, the WAC chose her--in her Greek form as Pallas Athene--to be their insignia, and I chose her to be in the title of my novel Women's Company - The Minerva Girls. 
​
​What's So Important About Insignia?

The armed forces take insignia quite seriously.  The creation of insignia for the WAC initially stumped designers.  Why?  Because insignia usually depict the function of the corps concerned and, when The Women's Army (and at that time Auxiliary) Corps was created in 1942, no one knew exactly what work the women would do.

According to historian Mattie Treadwell, an early draft for the insignia tried to resemble a busy-bee-like insect.  In the eyes of the WAAC director, however, it looked like a bug, and she "had no desire to be called the Queen Bee."  When designers came up with Pallas Athene--a goddess associated with "a variety of womanly virtues and no vices either womanly or godlike"--she won hands down.            
WAC insignia - Pallas Athene
What Does the Insignia Look Like?
A profile of the head of the Greek goddess, Pallas Athene, was selected for the WAC's lapel insignia, together with the traditional U.S. cut out for officers, and on discs for enlisted women.

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    Lynne Schall is the author of three novels:  Women's Company - The Minerva Girls (2016), Cloud County Persuasion (2018), and Cloud County Harvest (November 2022).  She and her family live in Kansas, USA.

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Copyright 2016 Lynne Schall.  All rights reserved.
Book Cover designs by Anastasia Sobol of Ukraine.
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