The true account of World War II as seen through eyes of thirty-four mid-Western Americans. Covering the war on a year by year basis, it is the story of how the war affected these individuals and their families, many times in their own words. Covered is not only the military who went off to war, but also the wives, the sweethearts, and the children of the military, as well as those who stayed behind to hold down the home front the factory worker, the German POW guard, the farmer. It is the story of how they willingly struggled with rationing, how they willingly assisted each other when the need arose, how they willingly collected recyclables and other goods for the war effort, without any expectation of compensation. It is also the story of the military members, why and when they entered the service as well as how they served their country in the time of need the B-17 ball turret gunner, the Higgins boat pilot, the Marine landing on Okinawa and Guam, the Japanese held POW, the WAC and the WAAC. In summary, it is the story of their war! A war that nobody, nobody shirked their duty.

Traces the crisis period leading up to America's entry in World War II, describing the nation's polarized interventionist and isolation factions as represented by the government, in the press and on the streets, in an account that explores the forefront roles of British-supporter President Roosevelt and isolationist Charles Lindbergh. (This book was previously featured in Forecast.)

The first full-length study of World War II from the Latin American perspective, this unique volume offers an in-depth analysis of the region during wartime. Each country responded to World War II according to its own national interests, which often conflicted with those of the Allies, including the United States. The contributors systematically consider how each country dealt with commonly shared problems: the Axis threat to the national order, the extent of military cooperation with the Allies, and the war's impact on the national economy and domestic political and social structures. Drawing on both U.S. and Latin American primary sources, the book offers a rigorous comparison of the wartime experiences of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Central America, Gran Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Panama, and Puerto Rico.

Discusses the prominent events and personalities of 1941 both on the home front and in the military campaigns in Europe and North Africa and in the Pacific.

The colossal scale of World War II required a mobilization effort greater than anything attempted in all of the world's history. The United States had to fight a war across two oceans and three continents--and to do so, it had to build and equip a military that was all but nonexistent before the war began. Never in the nation's history did it have to create, outfit, transport, and supply huge armies, navies, and air forces on so many distant and disparate fronts. The Axis powers might have fielded better-trained soldiers, better weapons, and better tanks and aircraft, but they could not match American productivity. The United States buried its enemies in aircraft, ships, tanks, and guns; in this sense, American industry and American workers, won World War II. The scale of the effort was titanic, and the result historic. Not only did it determine the outcome of the war, but it transformed the American economy and society. Maury Klein's A Call to Arms is the definitive narrative history of this epic struggle--told by one of America's greatest historians of business and economics--and renders the transformation of America with a depth and vividness never available before.

Includes primary sources on defense workers, women during the war, conscientious objectors, scrap metal collection and recycling, racial issues on the homefront, and civil defense.

Explores the events that led to World War II and the attack on Pearl Harbor, follows the major events of American participation in the war at home and overseas, and examines the American international role after the war.

New scholarship on World War II continues to broaden our understanding. With each passing year we know more about the triumphs and the tragedies of America’s involvement in the momentous conflict. Tapping into this greater awareness of the accomplishments of both soldiers and civilians and a better recognition of the consequences of decisions made, Allan Winkler presents the third edition of his highly popular series volume. Informed by the latest historical literature and featuring many new thoughtfully chosen photographs, the third edition of Home Front U.S.A. continues to ponder the question of "the good war," the moral implications of the use of the atomic bomb, the implications of expanding wartime roles for women, African Americans, American Jews, the imprisonment of Japanese Americans at the hands of the federal government, and the experiences of the many other people who, though relegated to the fringe of mainstream society, contributed in important ways to the nation's successful prosecution of its greatest challenge.

A masterful and comprehensive chronicle of World War II, by internationally bestselling historian Antony Beevor. Over the past two decades, Antony Beevor has established himself as one of the world's premier historians of WWII. His multi-award winning books have included Stalingrad and The Fall of Berlin 1945. Now, in his newest and most ambitious book, he turns his focus to one of the bloodiest and most tragic events of the twentieth century, the Second World War. In this searing narrative that takes us from Hitler's invasion of Poland on September 1st, 1939 to V-J day on August 14, 1945 and the war's aftermath, Beevor describes the conflict and its global reach -- one that included every major power. The result is a dramatic and breathtaking single-volume history that provides a remarkably intimate account of the war that, more than any other, still commands attention and an audience. Thrillingly written and brilliantly researched, Beevor's grand and provocative account is destined to become the definitive work on this complex, tragic, and endlessly fascinating period in world history, and confirms once more that he is a military historian of the first rank.

Even as the New Deal was coping with the Depression, a new menace was developing abroad. Exploiting Germany's own economic burdens, Hitler reached out to the disaffected, turning their aimless discontent into loyal support for his Nazi Party. In Asia, Japan harbored imperial ambitions of its own. The same generation of Americans who battled the Depression eventually had to shoulder arms in another conflict that wreaked worldwide destruction, ushered in the nuclear age, and forever changed their way of life and their country's relationship to the rest of the world. The American People in World War II--the second installment of Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize-winning Freedom from Fear--explains how the nation agonized over its role in the conflict, how it fought the war, why the United States emerged victorious, and why the consequences of victory were sometimes sweet, sometimes ironic. In a compelling narrative, Kennedy analyzes the determinants of American strategy, the painful choices faced by commanders and statesmen, and the agonies inflicted on the millions of ordinary Americans who were compelled to swallow their fears and face battle as best they could. The American People in World War II is a gripping narrative and an invaluable analysis of the trials and victories through which modern America was formed.