Opal Fisher

Opal Fisher was born in Athelstan Iowa in 1923, she attended Parnell high school and Northwest Missouri State University. Her interview mainly focuses on her experience during the 1940’s, more specifically during World War II. After attending Northwest, Opal speaks about her experience as a teacher in a rural community during the war. She also mentions her encounters with war rationing and making do with what she and her family had. She speaks about sewing and making clothes for her children. She also explains what she and her family did for fun during this time, mentioning activities like “playing ball” and pitch, or listening to the radio, as well as visiting her extended family often during the summers. She mentions that her husband was in service during World War II, although she didn’t meet him until he came home from the war in 1945. She also briefly talks about her opinion on the end of the war and its after effects.

Delbert and Hazel Jackson 

This is an Oral History abstract for Delbert and Hazel Jackson The purpose of this abstract is to give the reader an insight into Mr. and Mrs. Jacksons lives. Mr. Jackson was born October 21, 1925, in Ringgold County, Iowa. Mrs. Jackson was born May 10, 1930, she does not state where. Mr. Jackson joined The United States Army after high school and explains he was drafted into World War II, he also added that he was eighteen at the time and you were not supposed to see combat until you were nineteen. Mr. Jackson explains that he attended basic training in Texas and was then sent to active combat in Germany after not fully completing basic training. Mr. Jackson states his military company was Able Company, 376 Infantry, 94th Division. Mr. Jackson states that he was on the front lines for a third of the time he served overseas. Mr. Jackson explains that when arrived to the front lines it seemed like many of the German soldiers had given up hope on winning the war. Mr. Jackson states during his time he was awarded a bronze star and a purple heart. The oral History then discusses Mrs. Jacksons life while Mr. Jackson was at war. Mrs. Jackson explains she kept a small farm and garden. She added they had a fruit orchard. Mrs. Jackson states they sewed feed sacks into clothes to save supplies. Mrs. Jackson states she did not support the anti-Japan propaganda after the bombing of pearl harbor because she was taught not to hate.

Opal Jordan

​This is an Oral History abstract for Opal Jordan. The purpose of this abstract is to give the reader an insight into Mrs. Jordans life. Mrs. Jordan was born January 25, 1925, in Allendale Missouri. Mrs. Jordan explains that growing up she lived with her mother in Grant City Missouri. Mrs. Jordan also explains that she worked in a bomber plant in Omaha Nebraska this is when, in 1945, she enlisted in the United States Coast Guard. After enlisting Mrs. Jordan explains she was sent to bootcamp in New York, New York. Mrs. Jordan states that in 1946 when the war was over the government did not seem to know what to do with the women who had joined, so she was sent to a military separation center in San Francisco, California. Mrs. Jordan explains that at this separation center her main job was to type up military separation papers for soldiers leaving the force.  When Mrs. Jordan left the service, she explains that she moved to Chicago, Illinois to help her brother who had been injured during his military service. After he recovered Mrs. Jordan states that she moved back to Kansas City.

Ruth Gladstone

Ruth Gladstone was born on July 7, 1920, and served in World War II in the Navy in a branch known as Waves. She is a part of the Oral Histories of the Northwest Missouri of the 1940s project. This project is a collection of interviews and oral histories of people who lived during the 1940s and World War II. This project looks into the firsthand accounts from people who are still living and their experiences during the 1940s and World War II. Ruth went to high school in Wellesley. Ruth had brothers in the army, and she joined the Navy as a physical therapist. Gladstone was enlisted into WAVES in 1941. She was stationed in New York, Bethesda, Maryland, and Hunter College. She worked in the hospital doing the “easy work” that men couldn’t do. She saw patients with burns and nerve damage. Ruth met her husband while she was working in the hospital. Rith remembers the end of the war when the atomic bomb was dropped. She claims that there was peace after that happened. Ruth was the President of the VFW when it was first founded. Ruth and her husband took advantage of the GI bill and learned how to farm after the war.

Margie Conrad

Margie Conard, born July 5, 1924, shares her firsthand experiences of life during World War II in rural Missouri in an interview conducted on March 11, 2009. Growing up on a farm with eight siblings, Margie navigates the challenges of frequent moves due to her father's work with the WPA. As the oldest of all her siblings, she goes around to her local relatives and helps out as a “second mother” at a very young age because her mother wants to do activities, she was not able to do while raising her eight children. She recalls the impact of rationing on daily life, including using feed sacks for clothing, as well as having to use her mother’s clothes instead of getting her own, and the scarcity of household goods. Margie only remembers being saddened about what is happening in the outside world with the war but seems to stay in her bubble of small-town living as there is not much she can do about it. She also discusses post-war concerns, such as cancer risks from agricultural practices and how there was very little medicine and treatments to combat these diseases. Margie's narrative provides a unique perspective on the resilience and ingenuity of individuals on the home front during a confusing period in history.

 Wilbur Ray

​Amthor is interviewing Wilbur Ray, who was born in 1925 in Isadora, Missouri to a very large family with 12 other children. Ray has a rather wealthy grandfather who gifts his crippled father a large homestead of 350 acres to live off of. While he is registered in the draft, his family is told to provide for his country during World War 2 by providing food for the soldiers that are in fact fighting. The life of farmers during the Great Depression is very difficult and they only have enough food and resources to feed their large family. His perspective allows for a different view on the war because his family and himself are isolated from the outside world, which results in very little propaganda and only one radio channel informing them of the nationwide news. While many people in our modern day and age know where they are when major events like Pearl Harbor and the Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombings take place, he is mainly focused on providing for his family on the farms doing repetitive tasks. Because there is not much information on the life of the war itself, Ray is asked about what he does outside of the farming tasks. These include seeing local movies, playing cards, and listening to bands nearby his town.