“The Good War”: An Oral History of World War II

Terkel’s interviewees include women who enjoyed more personal freedom and career opportunities as a result of World War II. Despite this increased autonomy, they were pressured into marriage and suburban life by the increasingly conservative social attitudes of the United States at the time.

It is important to remember that gender roles and expectations affected men as well as women. The most striking example of this among Terkel’s interviewees is Ted Allenby, who admits he joined the Marines in the war to deal with his realization that he was gay because he had “that constant compelling need to prove how virile I was” (179). Even in a society as democratic as the United States, strong social compulsions and expectations motivated how individuals acted. Extreme rebels, like conscientious objector John H. Abbott, were definitely the outliers.