The history of Christmas--World War II (part 2)

The U.S. government used holiday poetry to urge consumers to buy U.S. Savings Bonds at Christmas: “Someday Yuletide bells will ring merrily again/and once more there will be laughter, joy, and mirth,” said one government public service ad. “Someday Christmas carolers will sing again/those songs we love that tell of ‘peace on earth’/ someday hearts will beat as they return again/ the husband father son…the neighbor’s boy/someday Christmas lights will brightly burn again/ illuminating those filled with joy.” It concluded: “Americans will observe this wartime ‘Holiday Season’ with but a single thought and purpose: the determination to focus all our energies and efforts on final victory.”

An ad for Chesterfield cigarettes showed Santa Claus, with a big bag full of smokes to distribute to American soldiers at the front, with a typical GI helmet clamped on his head.

And speaking of Santa, the coming of the war provoked questions about him, too.

For example, courtesy of the federal government, there now was a bureaucratic monstrosity called the War Labor Board, which, despite its flaws, nevertheless had an important job: controlling wages and employment, in order to prevent runaway inflation and strikes from crippling wartime production. It issued a wage-freeze order in the fall of 1942, setting most workers’ wages for the duration of the war at their January 1941 levels, plus fifteen percent. Apparently with Christmas coming, someone had to ask: what about the wages of those playing Santa Claus? Thus came the perhaps-only-half-serious WLB order of December 4, 1942: “Bona fide Santa Clauses shall be construed to be only such persons as wear a red robe, white whiskers, and other well-recognized accoutrements befitting their station in life, and provided that they have a kindly and jovial disposition and use their high office of juvenile trust to spread the Christmas spirit.” And—they were exempt from the wage-freeze order!

And who would play Santa during the war? Soon many cities faced a manpower shortage due to military service. By January 1945 there were no fewer than 16 million men (and some women) in uniform. To fill the vacuum, women increasingly entered the workplace. Munitions factories all had their "Rosie the Riveters" working the heavy machinery, a huge change from the past. By 1945, women made up 35% of all those in the workplace. Thus, in Chicago at one point during the war,, there were stories that stores would employ female Santas. But in response, in Poughkeepsie, New York, city officials made clear this would not be the case. there. "Santa will be Santa and there will be no bearded lady this Yuletide, as usual," harrumphed the local paper. "Of course, there are arguments in favor of a lady Santa during wartime. Women have been doing just about everything else that a man had done and probably there is little argument against why they couldn't help out St. Nick. But it would be quite a blow to the kids to climb aboard her lap and hear a staccato 'What would you like me to bring you, sonny?' in place of the customary voice of pleasant gruffness...there has to be a line drawn somewhere. And Santa Claus seems to be it."

But at least Santa, making his list and checking it twice, came to America—even during tough times.