What will you be doing for New Year’s?

Today is the first day of Winter and nearly the last day of the year. Only 10 days remain. Our world has seen its share of turmoil during the year—sometimes it seems everything is falling apart. But we are far from the first generation to experience trouble. Our recent forebears saw a great deal of it during the Second World War.

New Year’s 1941

Only a few weeks after the United States’ entry into the war, the Oakland Tribune in California reported snow on New Year’s Eve 1941. This West Coast city lay 2400 miles from Pearl Harbor and after the Japanese attack there, war eliminated weather reports from the newspaper and radio. The Army made an exception in allowing the Weather Bureau to report this snow so farmers could protect their crops.  People were barred from celebrating outdoors by Army and police restrictions. The usual football games had been canceled. For New Year’s Eve 1941 the West Coast went dark and stayed indoors.

In New York, 2900 miles in the other direction, Times Square was jammed with partiers and a vast police and firefighter presence in case of air raid. New Year’s Eve 1941, in New York city at least, was loud and crowded with civilians—and thousands of new soldiers and sailors—celebrating as if there were no tomorrow. For many of them, there was no other new year.

Other Wartime Celebrations

Times Square at the entrance to 1942 was strange by contrast. The New York Times topped their coverage writing, “Chill of war felt as vast crowd toots sluggishly on old and second-hand horns.” For the first time since 1907, the famous ball did not drop. This was partly due to energy conservation and black out restrictions, but also to Luftwaffe attack. Lights from cities illuminated nearby ships and made them targets for German U-Boats lying just offshore in the Atlantic.

The ball still didn’t drop in Times Square in 1943. Churches filled with people praying throughout the night and into the next day. “Reflections of civilians who lived on the Home Front may not have been the happiest because of their strong desire to have family and friends back home, but at least they were a unified mass of people, working together and thankful that they were alive to put in another productive year.” Americans on both the Home and War Fronts were learning anew to cherish precious connections and strengthen hope for being together again.

By New Year’s 1943 rationing was in full swing. Homemakers were encouraged to waste nothing. Waste fat from cooking was carefully cleaned and sold for military use. Kids roamed wherever they could, looking for scrap metal. Housing units were being authorized for war workers. Foodstuffs were being shipped to help feed Allies in Europe, who had more severe restrictions and dangers.

Overseas, millions were suffering from displacement and imprisonment, including tens of thousands of US and Allied prisoners of war. These were being starved along with civilian prisoners. But on a happier note, this was the year Rommel was stopped in North Africa and Guadalcanal was won. Guadalcanal was the battle where five American brothers from Iowa all died together.

On the East Coast in Wilmington, Delaware the Minker family spent several New Year celebrations separated because of war. On the final day of 1943 Mrs. Minker wrote to her son, Lee, hoping he received his Christmas box of cookies, candies and a watch. This same day, the 447th B.G. he worked with flew their third mission and lost two crews from flak outbursts.

The next New Year’s Eve in 1944, Lee wrote home but “did not mention the horror of the December 30 mission, when two planes from the 708th collided over the target…Two crews (18 men), who took off…that morning did not return.”

For New Year’s 1944 gasoline shortages kept most civilians home and it was reportedly one of the quietest New Years in history. Paper shortages forced newspapers to drastically cut the size of issues. Many current events went unreported for security reasons. Military and service personnel remained separated from loved ones. Isolation, uncertainty and mortal danger were everyday realities. By 1944 people felt the weight of all these things as another holiday season and new year came and went, with ongoing war. For some, the hope of a peaceful postwar life with loved ones was already shattered.

On New Year’s Eve 1944 Lee wrote to his sister that he had recently received 15 letters and planned to finish reading them before going to sleep early. His sister, Bernice, writing to him the next day on New Year’s 1945, described the party she had been to the night before. It had ended that morning with hamburgers, sodas and potato chips. Of the holiday package she had sent, she asked, “Were any of the eggs good? We kept one home but were unable to eat it.” Can any of us today imagine mailing fresh eggs from the US to Europe?!

Party Like It’s 1941

As difficult and challenging as the issues of our day are, we have so much to be thankful for—as did the 1940s generation. History shows that turmoil is inevitable and we suffer, and we work to overcome.

As this year draws to a close, I think about the lives of my grandparents and their generation during the War. I remember the stories they told and how brave they were. I also remember the many who are fighting battles on my behalf today. This New Year’s, I want to party like it’s 1941—engaged in the conflict of my day, thankful at every moment for all the good there is, and praying and working for victory.

 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Minker, Captain Ralph L., Sandra O’Connell, and Harry Butowsky. An American Family in World War II. Pennsylvania: Word Association Publishers, 2005.

Guise, Kim. 2021. “Hope for Next Year: New Year’s Letters from World War II.” The National WWII Museum New Orleans, December 31, 2021.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/new-years-letters-world-war-ii

_______. 2013. “New Year’s Eve 1945.” The National WWII Museum New Orleans, December 31, 2013. http://www.nww2m.com/2013/12/new-years-eve-1945/

Rego, Nilda. 2008. “New Year’s Celebrations during WWII.” East Bay Times, December 25, 2008 (Updated August 15, 2016).

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2008/12/25/new-year-s-celebrations-during-wwii/

Weber, Camille and Lauren Handley. 2017. “Home Front Friday: For Auld Lang Syne.” The National WWII Museum New Orleans, January 6, 2017. Excerpt from “400,000 Revelers Fill Times Square in Dim New Year’s.” New York Times, January 1, 1943.

http://www.nww2m.com/2017/01/home-front-friday-for-auld-lang-syne/

“The Backwash of Battle.” Life Magazine Vol. 18, No. 16 (April 16, 1945): 25-31.

Brown-Forman’s KING Blended Whisky advertisement. Life Magazine Vol. 21 No. 25 (December 16, 1945): 95.

“Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”

John 14:27